Simpsons Road Rage (PS2)

The main element of the game is the aforementioned Crazy Taxi-esque "Road Rage" mode. There are also Sunday Drive, multiplayer and mission modes. Sunday Drive allows you to pootle round the various levels at leisure for both sightseeing and tactical route-planning reasons; this is the best way to find those sneaky short cuts and hidden areas. Story mode adds a little extra sparkle to the game, with a set series of missions to complete--for example, Homer's skived off work for the afternoon and you, as Bart, have to sneak your dad past the evil Mr Burns and back into work.

As with most racing games, you're rewarded for reaching set point totals and completing the missions, but the difference with Simpson's Road Rage is that you get to choose your reward, be it unlocking one of the secret characters like Groundskeeper Willie and his tractor or opening extra maps like the Springfield nuclear power plant. The real high point of Simpson's Road Rage, though, is the sound. No Homer-a-likes here--each character has their own real voice from the show, the one-liners aren't too repetitive and do lend themselves to the type of situation that the characters find themselves in, and some of the lines are laugh-out-loud funny. All in all, recommended for fans of the show, Crazy Taxi nuts and those gamers who are partial to unpretentious pick-up-and-play gaming. --Laurent S Hall

1: There are 6 levels (Taxi has 2 if I remember correctly, although they are huge)
2: There are more cars each with a different Simpson's Character and design (not just 3 taxis!)
3: There are other missions to play within it
4: It has a multiplayer
5: There's an insentive to play it because the more money you earn the more levels and cars you unlock
6: The graphics aren't realistic like Taxi but they do look like a simpsons episode in 3d!

Personally I found Taxi boring after about 20 minutes and I found this an all round more enjoyable game even though it is a pure rip-off. Can't wait for Simpson's Tony Hawk...er I mean, Simpson's Skateboarder!

The only bad things about this game I found were the loading times, it takes about 30 seconds to load a level and it even has to reload just to restart a level, which needless to say is tedious. Also, I have to admit Taxi is more challenging. Simpson's is very easy on Hard.


Crazy Taxi Eat Your Heart Out   May 25, 2004
C. Smith (Devon, England)
16 out of 17 found this review helpful

A lot of people say that this is not as good as Crazy Taxi, but I strongly disagree. This is a great game.

There are four modes. "Road Rage", "Sunday Drive", "Mission Mode" and "Head to head". The first game mode "Road Rage" is the main mode. In this mode you get to pick from one of six locations (once unlocked) and from over twenty five authentic Simpsons characters (once unlocked). Your target is to earn a million dollars from taking people to where they want to go. It takes a very long time to get this amount but you get a feeling of satisfaction when you do.

"Sunday drive" is just like free mode in Tony Hawks. You get to drive around your chosen location with your chosen character. Use this to learn the areas so that you can drop your passenger off quicker. You can also find out some sneaky shortcuts and where they go. (HINT: look for a dirt track leading off of the road.)

"Mission mode" is a fairly tricky mode. You have to complete a task in a certain amount of time and when you complete all of the tasks you get a nice little treat. So don't give up on task 10.

"Head to head" is your old fashioned two player mode. You and a mate race around the same loction with different characters picking up passengers and delivering them to their destinations. But its not that simple, your mate can steal your passenger and deliver them!

RATINGS:
GRAPHICS: This game has fantastic graphics. All of the characters look like they are meant to and their cars are the ones that they have in the show. The environments are also extremely similar to the ones in the show. RATING:*****

SOUND: All of the characters have the same voices as in the show. When you go flying over a bump your character will yell something funny and all of the way around all of the passengers speak to you and criticise your driving which is extremely funny sometimes. RATING: ****

GAMEPLAY: This game runs extremely smoothly and fast. All of the cars skid around corners and you lose control in the blink of an eye. The controls are not hard at all; they're just the basic driving game controls. RATING: ****

LIFESPAN: This is the main downfall of the game. Although it sounds like fun to earn a million dollars it actually gets extremely repetitive at about 800,000 dollars, but keep going it's a good feeling when you finish because you know all of your hard work has payed off. RATING: ***

Overall this game is a decent game; if you're a Simpsons fan you should buy it because it's not as bad as some people say. (Also you'll know what some of the characters are talking about, if you don't watch the simpsons you probably won't find this game as funny.)


Tries to beat Crazy Taxi and does!!   May 5, 2002
12 out of 15 found this review helpful

I wasnt that much of a fan of crazy taxi, but when i played the simpsons road rage it was love at first sight. I just couldnt put the controller down and as im a huge fan of the simpsons knew all about the characters, thier cars and locations like Kamp Krusty or the presidents house facing the simpsons residence.
Although the graphics might not be the playstation 2's finest, they still caputure the pure cartoony fun of the simpsons.
There is a number of game modes like road rage where you drive round town taxing people for money and money means new cars and locations. Then there mission mode which is 10 missions, most of which are knock down so many of an object before the time runs out, but when you finish all ten you will be rewarded with one of the fastest and worst looking cars in the game.
There is also a split screen mode which is just like capture the flag but is capture the fare but its not up to much.
Overall i think simpsons road rage is an addictive, fun game but it will get boring after a while.


A good game but a bit repetitive   December 21, 2002
Matt (Middlesex, England)
10 out of 10 found this review helpful

I bought this game 4 months ago after I played it round a friends house it was good for a few days but after that it got a bit boring. I personally think that the the levels are a bit small and there are not enough of them. The missions are not very challeging and after 5 attempts at the missions you can skip the level, exept for the final mission which isn't that hard either.

But there are some good things about this game like the ammount of charecters and vehicles also the multiplayer is quite good aswell. Another thing I find good about this game is the charecters voices but unfortunately it gets so repetitive for example if you are Chief Wiggum and you play a level it doesn't matter which one it is, for 10 minutes, he is likely to say the same phrase about 25 times in just that short space of time.

The best part of the whole game though is the Sunday drive mode which is just cruising smashing things up and running over people.

Overall a good game but could do with bigger, better and more levels. Ideal for people that watch the Simpsons on tv, people who like crazy taxi or people who fancy smashing up stuff and runnig over people.


COULD BE BETTER   October 26, 2001
darrenclarke87@aol.com (Coalville,Leics,England)
9 out of 20 found this review helpful

This game is more for children and its a bit boring,its funny at first but as it goes on it starts to repeat itself. In my opinion you should stick to more realistic games, e.g. GRAN TURISMO 3 and FORMULA 1. So save your money until a better game is brought out.