Midtown Madness 2 (PC Game Review)

I can never forget the fun I had with the original Midtown Madness (MTM), which (BTW) I never completed... It was so insane, in such a "true" Chicago environment, and with such addictiveness, that I simply could NOT stop playing it.

Part of the MTM craze was born in the lack of decent alternatives. MTM kind of debuted a new genre. Most of the car games were (and are) about racing, despite the majority of the software not even worrying about Physics, so it was really cool to play a "honest", straight title where there was more to do, than just fighting the clock. Blitz races were born. Competitors with different cars were there. And the most insisting police cars, ever, were not only on your tale, but mostly on your front and top :). Crashing can be fun.

If you go now play the original MTM, on a powerful PC, you should find Chicago rather empty, even with all the graphics options set to the max. Buildings and cars have very few textures; roads clearly extend to the sidewalks (making your life easier than it should), and the available vehicles can get too familiar. You are needing a NEW madness!

Expect no more. Midtown Madness 2 (MTM2) is here! This time, it is not a Chicago edition, but a San Francisco edition, which is a better choice, as this city is the world's top spot for car pursuits, after Steve McQueen and Bullit (go check about that movie!). But hold your horses! London / England is here too! MTM2 doubles the available cities!

What else is new in MTM2? Answer: ten new vehicles, more complex graphics, and a new "crash course mission mode". That is it. Bluntly, you have the same playing styles and the same challenges: facing the compromise between speed and max damage, when choosing a vehicle; dealing with the cops; and learning the map.

The game is now much harder, at least when you play as a "professional". I had a *very* hard time beating the clock, in blitz races "Golden Race"and "Amazing Grace".

"Golden Race"seemed impossible until the moment I used a police car: the 1968 Mustang wouldn't speed fast enough, the Panoz Roadster is so light that it went wild when airborne, the Mini Morris simply hasn't the horse power, and the buses are useless for speeding... So, "Golden Race"is hard, but very interesting: starting in central San Francisco, then flying up (and down) until the Golden Gate bridge, and finally having a nightmare at the end of it...

"Amazing Grace" seems harder than "Golden Race", but it is easier. In fact, "Amazing Grace" feels absolutely impossible, the first time you try it, but then you will learn how to perfect the available time. This "track" ends up being easier than "Golden Race", because it is more constant, try after try - meaning that you get less changeable factors on your path.

Let me quantify how hard the new blitz races are: the best I achieved in "Golden Race"was to complete it with 2 seconds left, out of the initial 90; in "Amazing Grace"... it was with less than 1 second left, out of 60, but in fewer tries.

The new graphics are all about more polygons and more objects on screen. While driving, you'll easily spot more trees, more garbage cans, more people, more detail on the tarmac's texture, more detail on the buildings, and a textured sky that can cost a lot in frames-per-second, if you opt for cloud shadows. You might notice the ducks on the water, the planes, and a real boost on the color scheme, that brings life to the cities.

Night driving is now a serious challenge. Sometimes there is fog and you'll have a very limited vision ahead.

A wet road now has a more "real" effect on the car handling: a powerful engine will spin the wheels, when in full throttle, so you'll skid and lose time.

The new "crash courses" are fun, but consist of no more than sequences of the regular blitz and checkpoint challenges, so there really is no novelty there.

MTM2 is funnier than ever! You'll need a good PC to enjoy it, but if you do, you'll have the greatest "urban racing", as Angel Studios (the developers for Microsoft) says.