Game Review: Midtown Madness 3

Game: Midtown Madness 3
Console: Microsoft Xbox
Developer: Digital Illusions CE
Release Date: 17th June 2003

With the first two instalments on PC, Midtown Madness was a series that largely flew under my radar at the time of its release. The third and final release in the series, Midtown Madness 3 challenges players to go undercover in 2 cities; Paris and Washington D.C. in order to solve 2 cases through working in a variety of jobs such as Delivery Worker, Limo Driver, Ambulance Driver and finally breaking their cover to solve each case.

Each job has 4 missions, 3 of which are available once the job has been unlocked and a fourth which unlocks after every other mission has been completed. Beating the final mission on a job will unlock the next job and allow players to continue progressing through the game. Most missions are under 5 minutes in length though their difficulty increases as the game progresses, and some of the harder ones take a few tries to beat.

While the handling is arcade like for the most part, it's pretty easy to get used to and despite crashes being difficult to avoid sometimes, driving is still a fun experience. The overall sense of speed isn't anything special, and often 120mph on the speedometer will feel more like 60-70mph. The range of cars featured in the game is good, although there's a large amount of service vehicles such as taxis, ambulances, and delivery cars rather than licensed vehicles. Alternative paint jobs for each car are hidden around the two cities, though they're not really worth collecting unless you're a completionist.

The two cities featured in the game are fairly large in size, especially for the era though they're certainly not as large as their real life counterparts. Paris feels as if it has more character and point of interest than Washington D.C. but this may be true in real life as well as in game. Aside from the main undercover mode, there's some race modes and a free roam available, but these are only supplementary and don't entertain for long.

Undercover mode has some interesting moments and is well worth playing, but can be inconsistent in terms of overall difficulty. Both campaigns are fairly similar, with the same mission types and even some of the same professions appearing across both cities. Gameplay is reminiscent of such games as Super Runabout and even Crazy Taxi at times, with a floating arrow that sometimes sends players the wrong way.

While the overall story might not be all that enjoyable, the mission based concept and humourous presentation give the game an element of fun and light heartedness that is perhaps missing from many games of the present day. Sometimes it's fun just to see how much mayhem can be caused, though without much of a damage engine, it's difficult to measure quite how much chaos has occurred.

Graphically the game features some impressive visuals for having been released in 2003. The cars, buildings, and scenery are all fairly detailed, especially for the map size, and the only real letdowns are the slightly wonky physics engine and lack of damage to cars. Musically the game has a fairly bland electronic accompaniment which is drowned out by engine noise, and most other sound effects.

Overall Midtown Madness 3 is a decent driving game which allows players to work undercover in a variety of jobs, following a humourous storyline with a few standout missions. There's nothing to keep players coming back though, and one playthrough of the undercover mode should be more than sufficient to experience all the game has to offer.

Rating: 64/100
Grade: C