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The first two Midtown Madness games showcased some cool stuff for the racing genre. Set in partial recreations of real world cities, you could say they are open world arcade-style racing games. At the time they released, the freedom they offered made them stand out in the genre. While they may feel a bit lacking in today’s world, they are still kept alive by a small but active modding community. Some time after Midtown Madness 2, developer Angel Studios was purchased by Take-Two Interactive and renamed Rockstar San Diego. They moved on to work on the Midnight Club games so development duties of the third Midtown Madness was handed over to Digital Illusions CE, also known as DICE. Developed by Digital Illusions CE and published by Microsoft Game Studios, Midtown Madness 3 was released exclusively for Xbox in June, 2003.
Unlike the previous games, Midtown Madness 3 does contain a storyline. Two storylines in fact. With cut scenes. The game features two cities; Paris and Washington D.C. and a game mode called Work Undercover with missions or jobs set in each one. One might say it’s an expanded version of the Crash Course mode from Midtown Madness 2. They took the concept and just ran with it. In the Paris storyline, the player works for an agency tasked with protecting a famous racer. In the Washington D.C. storyline, the player assumes the role of a private investigator who is tasked with investigating two brothers who are making a movie. As the mode’s name implies, the player will be working undercover, taking on multiple professions and completing jobs to advance the storylines.
The storylines are accompanied by voice acting and both aim for humor. While not all of the comedy landed for me, I appreciate the family friendly tone the game is going for. The events in the storylines are often silly complete will silly characters and dialogue. The stories are far from amazing but the mode is somewhat refreshing even if the jobs are mundane. On the plus side, completing jobs does unlock vehicles. The professions don’t do the greatest job at masking the fact that you’re objectives are simple and there’s not much variety to them. You’ll work as a security guard, police officer, paramedic, chauffer, taxi driver, car salesman and a bunch of other professions. But after a while, it all starts to feel a little repetitive because there’s very little variety to the objectives. Not only that, most don’t offer much in the way of challenge in my experience. You’ll pick people up and drop them off, drive from A to B, follow vehicles, smash vehicles until they stop, and even participate in some races.
Midtown Madness 3 comes with both offline and multiplayer game modes but I was unable to try the multiplayer. If you’ve played the previous games, all of what’s here should be familiar. You’ve got your Cruise mode, Blitz races, and Checkpoint races. For some reason, Circuit races were cut and I do feel the single player is a bit lacking. There’s only ten races for Blitz and Checkpoint for each city and I didn’t have too much trouble completing them all. I know the multiplayer does offer more game modes and it would have been cool to see some of them, if not all of them, carried over to the single player.
Unfortunately, Midtown Madness 3 lacks customization options much like its predecessors. Not only that, you can’t even configure options for Blitz and Checkpoint races after completing them. You can adjust the pedestrian, police, and traffic densities along with season, time of day, and weather in the Cruise mode but that’s it. On the plus side, Midtown Madness 3 does choose the opponents for Checkpoint races and adjusts the time you’re given for Blitz races based on your vehicle choice which I think is my favorite aspect of the game. This means if you choose a fast car for a Checkpoint race, the opponents will be fast cars, and you’ll be given more time in Blitz races if you choose a slow car and less time if you choose a fast car. I welcome the concept of the race parameters dictated by the vehicle you select because it gives every vehicle a fair chance. I still would have preferred being able to create custom races and/or choose my own opponents but this is nice and does add a good amount of replay value to the modes.
I think one of my bigger complaints with this game is the lack of challenge. Don’t get me wrong, I failed some jobs and lost some races but it was usually due to my own mistakes or maybe it took me a couple of tries to really get the route down. But in general, I can’t say it’s all that difficult to complete the game and unlock everything. There are no difficulty levels to select from and the opponent AI is only decent at best. In my experience, the AI vehicles here are not as aggressive as those in the previous games and they don’t seem to cut corners which gives you an edge. You can easily get ahead by taking off-road shortcuts because the AI only seems to stick to the roads. I would say unlocking all the paint jobs for the vehicles is probably the most challenging thing to do, assuming you don’t use a guide. As you drive around the cities, you’ll find paint cans that you can collect but you have to be driving the vehicle associated with a can to collect it. The easiest way to get them is in the Cruise mode since you have no objectives but if you make collecting paint cans your focus, you’ll find it can be tedious having to exit the mode to change your vehicle every time you want to collect a new can.
I do feel Midtown Madness 3 is probably the best game in the series from a gameplay standpoint but I do think it could have been better. When compared to the previous games, I feel Midtown Madness 3 has the best vehicle handling, the cities are much bigger and much more detailed, and it has the biggest selection of vehicles up to this point. Unfortunately, the developers didn’t expand the police in any way. They are still just moving obstacles. In fact, they’re not present in Checkpoint races. They only appear in some undercover jobs and the Cruise mode. And once again, there’s not much to do in the cities so the Cruise mode can get boring after a while. The mode’s primary purpose is freedom and that’s what it’s always been about. To test drive vehicles, explore, and basically do whatever you want. If you’re into that – driving around, driving off jumps, discovering shortcuts, getting cops to chase you – then the Cruise mode should prove to be a good time. But if you’re looking for a world with things to actually do, then look elsewhere or go to the other game modes. As it stands, I think the lack of things to do and modes other than what the series is already known for is a bigger detriment here than it ever was before.
Visually, Midtown Madness 3 is by far the best looking game in the series and I would even stay the presentation still holds up today. This is a good looking Xbox game. The vehicle models look good, the cities are really well detailed, and the weather and visual effects look nice. You can crash into a lot of shit on the roads, send things flying, and traffic and pedestrians will fill the streets helping to make the cities feel somewhat alive. As for the audio, Midtown Madness 3 contains my least favorite soundtrack in the series. The songs aren’t bad, some are catchy, but I still say the first game has the best music. Also, in my opinion, the announcers here aren’t as funny as those in the last game. On the technical side, I think I noticed the frame rate dip briefly here and there but it was never bad and I encountered no major issues.
I like Midtown Madness 3 but I am a little shocked the developers didn’t do more with it. At this point, the undercover mode is the only unique thing about it but it leans very much in the mundane territory. Other than that, this is a lot like its predecessors but with Circuit races cut. I enjoy the bigger selection of vehicles, the bigger and more detailed cities, and the vehicle handling but once again, I’m disappointed with the lack of content and customization options. Plus, this game is exclusive to Xbox so it’s not like there’s a whole lot of mods keeping it alive, either. I know open world games set in urban environments were on the rise when Midtown Madness 3 released and I think this could have been one of the games to really break the mold for the racing genre. To expand upon the open world city concept. But instead, the developers decided to stick with the tried and true formula. It may not do anything innovative or things we haven’t seen before but it is a fun arcade-style racing game and it’s also very accessible. It’s not hard to beat the Undercover jobs or the races. It is nice that races give every vehicle a fair chance now but at this point, I expected more.
I would recommend Midtown Madness 3 because it is fun. It’s a fun and accessible racing game that I feel could have been better. If you’re a fan of the previous games, I don’t think this will disappoint but there’s also not a whole lot of surprises here, either. I am disappointed that the developers didn’t do more. But it’s far from a terrible game and if you can find a copy for cheap, I would say definitely check it out.