Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition

"Fast Cars, Slow Loading Times."

Originally, I had the Xbox Remix version of this game back when I had the original Xbox. I had to sell it when I got my 360 because it wasn't backwards compatible. I was delighted to find that there was a PSP version after I bought a PSP, so it was the first game to go into my PSP. The only difference I found between it and the Xbox version was the loading time and controls.

Gameplay: 10/10
The gameplay will blow you away! Probably the best part of Midnight Club 3 is the car customization. This is the most detailed part of the game, with more options than any other racing game I've played. Whenever you buy/win a new car you'll spend about 30 minutes turning it into the perfect pimp-machine. Color the car, add vinyls, change the bumpers, add spinners, hydraulics, and everything else! After you have your decked-out vehicle, you can take it out to one of 3 massive cities to participate in hundreds of street races. You have 4 basic kinds of races to choose from. You can participate in a tournament, challenge other street racers, join car clubs, or race in an unlimited (seriously!) amount of random street races. The controls are definitely easy to use, and can be customized to a limit if need be. They are a bit more simplified because of the smaller number of buttons than an Xbox or PS2, so you may be a bit worried about breaking the fragile shoulder buttons if they are assigned to a commonly used button. Anyways, the control system consists of the normal functions you will find in most racing games. The ones you will be using the most are acceleration, nitrous (turbo), and drift. In MC3, there's no need for brakes! There are brakes if you need them, but the racing is so fast that you'll rarely be stopping for ice cream! All of the races take place through a city, with the exception of timed races, which involve walled tracks. This game was NOT built for slow racing, so if you ever find yourself stopped, the speed HUD will become a bit unrealistic when you take off. Right when you press the gas, your speed will fly up to at least 75 mph immediately in faster cars. The one downside to MC3 gameplay is the loading times. I think Rockstar stuffed EVERYTHING from the console version of this game into the PSP, and so the loading times are horrendous! I doubt there will ever be a Remix version of this game for the PSP, because then the game size would simply be too large. The loading times are what knocked off the game off of the 10/10 score.

Graphics 10/10
As I said before, this game was built for speed. You won't be stopping to check out the city's graphics in the middle of a race. What you will be seeing are the car graphics (not the traffic). The street racing cars are AMAZING looking. After you complete your customization, they look as if they were photographs! The edges are very smooth, and you won't be finding any 2-D graphics on them. Only 3-D gem graphics. Now, if you DO stop to look at the city graphics, you won't be TOO disappointed. The traffic is made up completely of 2-D graphics pasted together into a 3-D model. They don't look too bad, though it will get annoying if you (for some reason) are driving slowly. The buildings look pretty much the same, but are more 3-D and are fully tolerable to look at. The cities are well put together and are not repetitive in any way. You aren't limited to the streets, either. There are malls, parks, and alleyways you can blow through. The graphics are certainly better than your average racing game. They were ported from the console version, and are toned down a bit to fit in but max out the PSP's capabilities.

Sound 9/10
If long and sweet was a phrase, I would use it instead of short and sweet. Sure, you have the sounds of your engine, the screeching when you drift around a corner, and the smashing sound of a collision. But what Rockstar focused on in Midnight Club 3 was the soundtrack. They put a lot of thought into the soundtrack, and carefully selected a large number of songs just perfect for a street racing game. The songs are also chosen to fit a variety of fans, whether you are into rap, hip-hop, rock, metal, dance, or drum/base. But they are also built to fit into the style of street racing. When you're flying down the streets, you will want a good beat with some crazy tune coming out of your speakers. You will like all the songs no matter what kind of music you like.

Replayability 10/10
As the editor said in the manual, this game was made to provide you with a never-ending amount of street racing and car customization to give you full satisfaction. This game literally never ends. Even if you beat all of the car clubs, defeat all of your challengers, or clear out all of the tournaments, you still have an unlimited amount of street races and cars to customize.

Buy or Rent/or not?
Why are you even reading this section? If you like any kind of racing, get out there and buy this game!

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/04/07