Midnight Club II - PlayStation 2

The game begins with you in the charge of a slob named Moses. He acts as tutor, teaching you how to control your beater car and how to use power-ups, as well as offering overall moral support. He teaches you how to go about the business of the game: earning new gear such as Nitrous Oxide, new cars, and even new controls. The award of new controls later in the game show how you're a novice driver at the start but by the end you're a pro who can land on all four wheels after a jump, expertly control a power slide turn, and much, much more.

Much of the game consists of cruising around three large and well rendered cities: Paris, Tokyo, and Los Angeles. You don't just challenge someone to a race or sign up for an event and show up. Instead you get a map and have to follow a red dot. The dot is a rival racer. Once you track and chase him down, you flash your high beams and then you can race him. It's a clever way of giving you a warm up, keeping you immersed in the game, and best of all, teaching you the layout of each city.

Racing is fun, fast, and furious. This isn't a simulation, it's an arcade-style racer--but the physics system is internally consistent so it feels more "realistic" than it actually is. Rockstar has put a premium on keeping you in control, keeping the thrill-factor high, and giving you a heart stopping sense of speed. The graphics are fantastic and the cities are incredibly detailed. As a counter-point, the voice acting is just plain awful.

Midnight Club II offers a wide range of game modes ensuring it will be playable for a long time to come: career, mission, and a mode that lets you just jump into a race. Multiplayer is possible in hotseat mode, but it also supports Internet play. Internet lag is bad over dial-up modem (PS2), but broadband players (Xbox Live or PS2) will find the game silky smooth. All of this makes Midnight Club II a great addition to any videogame racing fan's library, but a must for online fans.--Bob Andrews

Pros: Great physics, intense action Excellent graphics Plenty of game modes, including broadband multiplayer Cons: Poor voice acting

Amazon.com Product Description
In Midnight Club II you are an elite, next-generation illegal street racer, racing through the cities of Paris, Los Angeles, and Tokyo. Each location boasts open-ended routes, loads of shortcuts, and massive jumps. Filled with pedestrians, vehicles backing out of driveways, benches, lights, parking meters, trash, and other municipal properties, these living cities will require complete concentration and deft driving skills.