Fulfill Your Driving Fantasies

I must confess, before I begin, that in real life, I belong to the white-knuckled, "10-and-2" school of driving. I'm never in a big enough hurry to play the bob-and-weave game on the freeway to shave precious seconds off my drive time.
That said, I do sometimes wish that I could shirk my reserved driving style, take to the road with all speed, and realize the liberty of wide-open racing. Luckily for me, that wish came true in the form of a shiny disc of gaming and driving goodness called Midtown Madness 3.

Midtown Madness 3 is a playground, or more accurately, two finely detailed playgrounds, where you can live out all of your wildest driving fantasies. The game has recreated, with startling accuracy, the cities of Washington, D.C. and Paris. Should you ever feel the need to rip donuts around the Washington Monument, you can be assured that the developer has got your back.

There are a number of game modes in Midtown Madness 3, and they range from Single Race to a bevy of multiplayer options that include split-screen, system link, and Xbox Live. Since no one was handy to try out multiplayer, I decided to check out yet another mode: Work Undercover. Work Undercover is essentially theMidtown Madness 3 career mode, which, like all other aspects of the game, is divided into two parts: one for Washington, D.C. and another for Paris. I've never been to our great nation's capital, so I opted for D.C.

Moments later, I found myself driving a "salmon"-colored (it wasn't pink, I tell you!) 1959 Eldorado Seville and delivering pizzas for the aptly named Tortellini brothers. It only took a short while for the game to shatter my preconceptions. Over the years, I have become accustomed to the "driving on predetermined paths" philosophy that has dominated racing games. Midtown Madness 3 chooses a different route and is the better for it. Instead of going down one road to the finish line, you hurtle toward end goals by going in, out, up, down, and around an entire city. Which way do you want to go today? It's up to you—that's the point.

Along with the freedom to tear through pristine parks, to bypass a corner by plowing through an outdoor café, and to drop off an overpass by means of an impromptu shortcut, I also discovered the liberating beauty of total driving freedom. The sounds of gunning engines and screeching tires would normally be cause for alarm, but in the vibrantly rendered world on my TV screen, crumpled fenders and shattered hoods became badges of honor. Fishtailing around corners to block off my competition quickly became a favorite pastime, as did knocking lampposts, street-signs, garbage cans, benches, and other cars into my fellow racers' paths.

I unlocked the 1959 Eldorado Seville after completing the crazed Pizza Deliverer missions, and I promptly went to Single Race mode to try out the Blitz races. Here, I was treated to a glimpse of all the content I had yet to see. I counted a whopping 26 vehicles waiting to be unlocked, and that's not even counting all the different paint jobs you can unlock as well. Midtown Madness 3 is full of new cars—30 in all, many of them fully licensed—as well as paint jobs, missions, blitz races, and checkpoint races that need to be unlocked. For the complete racing junkies out there, you've got plenty of game to work through before you're done.

Since I was there checking out the available cars, I decided to give the Single Race mode a whirl. I've had a soft spot for hatchbacks since college, so I decided to give the 1985 Renault R5 a go. After car selection, I had the option to choose manual or automatic transmission. In a moment of gaming ego, I went for manual. Let me tell you, once you get the hang of it, shifting manually is the way to go. It allows for much more individual control.

I'd love to sit around and talk more, but I have a date with multiplayer, and I don't plan on missing it!

By Alex McLain