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Crazy Taxi 2 Preview
Chris Leyton
00/12/0000
Let's get ready to make some more crazzzy money.
Get ready for some crazy action as Crazy Taxi 2 is soon about to hit the Dreamcast. You know the score drive mad in your cab, pick up passengers and take them to their destinations, the more you get the higher the score, simple yet so fun.
No one was suprised at the original's success; combining addictively mad action, great graphics and a tight soundtrack Crazy Taxi had most of us hooked. The sequel is set to once again turn us all into cabbies from hell. Thankfully Sega knew they were on to a good one and decided not to change much, rather make it more of a deeper experience then the arcade shallowness of it's predecessor.
This time you'll be racing around streets based on a New York theme, which allows for a slightly different gameplay style and introduces the only major change; the addition of the 'Crazy Hop manouever. Unfortunately there's no trick to pull off to achieve this, simply pressing a button results in your car jumping 30Ft in the air, after the originals tricks in which you had to master a move this seems to simplify the game a tad. Having said that you do need to use the hop a lot, the New York car population is far greater then that of San Francisco so you'll be hopping like around like rabbits at times.
Another addition is the ability to pick up multiple passengers, at certain points there'll be a crowd of characters that jump on in and you'll have a fixed time to take them all to where they want to go, this is one sure way to rack up your score.
On the presentation stakes this is more of the same, which means bright colourful graphics and a Offspring derived soundtrack, thankfully there's none of the originals slowdown and generally the game is looking better then it's predecessor but only just.
The game is divided in to two areas like the first game, there's 'Small Apple' and 'Around Apple' modes and these are structured much like the orginal with the latter being a more open environment to explore. On the whole the levels seem to be significantly bigger then the originals signifying Sega's determination to make this game more suited to the home environment. The levels also place more importance on multi-platforms so you're going to be needing that 'Crazy Hop' move to get the secret fares.
Like the original there's a 'Crazy Box' mode however this time it's been called the 'Crazy Pyramid' mode due to the nature you open up other challenges. It's larger then the originals and the events are more diverse. The mini-games that I managed to get a peek at included a crazy jump challenge, much like the first game launch yourself off a jump and see how much ground you can clear. Next up 'Crazy Golf', situated in front of you is an oversized golfball and tee. You've got to hit the ball as hard as possible whilst getting the best angle, it's a simple idea but strangely compelling. Finally comes 'Crazy Hurdle', here you've got to hop over the hurdles which requires alternatively dashing and hopping, harder then it sounds I can assure you.
One element that Sega has gone quiet over is the addition of a 4p mode, this was announced when they first showcased the title but seems to have fallen by the wayside, as no screenshots show this mode, it wasn't available at E3 and Sega has gone very quiet on it. This will be a great shame as 4P Crazy Taxi would make it a must have title, however it looks like we may just be getting an update which will be harder to reccomend to those who own the original.
Comments
Hopefully Sega will get the 4P mode in, the rest of the 'Crazy Pyramid' challenges will be as good as the ones I've seen and they'll have a 'London Cab' as a secret car, if this all comes true (I'm not too bothered about the last one Sega) we'll have another AAA title in the Dreamcast collection.
