Midtown Madness 2 is a free roam racing/arcade sequel to Midtown Madness,
part of the Midtown Madness series, developed by Angel Studios (now
Rockstar San Diego) and published by Microsoft Game Studios, which
features a range of vehicles which can be driven around London and San
Francisco.
The game features Blitz, Checkpoint, Circuit, and Cruise modes, which are all derived from the original Midtown Madness
game. Winning Blitz, Checkpoint and Circuit races allows you to unlock
new vehicles and paint jobs. The Cruise mode lets you roam freely like
a maniac around the two open world recreations of London and San
Francisco.
A Crash Course can be completed in each of the cities. The Cab Driving School in London follows an extremist view of a London Cab driver, where a player must complete objectives in a London cab. The Stunt Driver
course in San Francisco allows the player to gain experience in stunt
driving for a Hollywood movie, using the Ford Mustang Fastback.
Players can change variables which affect the vehicle's performance
and visual appearance of the game before starting a race, such as the
weather and time of day. Additionally, police vehicles frequency can be
modified, as with the amount of traffic and pedestrians.
Every race or cruise would begin with someone commenting. These commenters would also be heard at the end of a race (not a cruise)
saying something that depends on your position upon finishing. They
can give you helpful hints, or razz to you about your performance or
generally tease you. Especially in Crash Courses,
commenters can be downright mean with their comments. Fortunately,
those can be turned off. The commenters would be different for each
race, and they are different for each city (i.e. someone commenting in
San Francisco would not be heard in London, or vice versa). These
include for San Francisco: a newscaster, a hippie,
a stunt driving instructor, a short-tempered film director and a
rapper. for London: a Scottish man, an English woman and man, and
(presumably through her elegant-sounding voice) Queen Elizabeth II,
although the woman mispronounces English words using the American slang terms instead.
One of the game's most entertaining aspects is its humour; for example,
the hippie in San Francisco singing out-of-tune variation of John
Lennon song Give Peace a Chance, or the Scottish man in London waffeling What do mean you're not wearing a kilt ??
In races (except circuit) and cruise mode, the other traffic cars
beeping and yelling colorful comments to you bring also a special
entertainment in playing the game.
There are a wide variety of iconic vehicles to choose from, such as the Aston Martin DB7 Vantage, New Mini
Cooper and the Audi TT. Each vehicle includes a number of unique paint
jobs. Some vehicles also contain unlockable special paint jobs,
accessed by completing certain races or Crash Course challenges (or getting a mod off Midtown Madness Archive.
