New York City Driver

Genre: Driving / Racing Game

Players: 1

.

Review:

(Note: This game is included in the Rush Hours Collection bundle, along with Drift & Drive)

New York City Driver, released on Nintendo Switch in 2023, is a game that has players driving various cars in a Simulation-style game that tasks you with getting through a series of checkpoints and then parking in a designated spot as fast as you can without colliding with too many obstacles (or sometimes simply getting to a finish line).

(Note: This game shares a lot in common with the trio of games that were in Speedster’s Collection, including this game having many of the same assets. As such, I have copied my review for those games here, changing it based on what is different this time)

The presentation here is decent but unspectacular, with sufficient 3D visuals that get the job done, but not especially well. There’s plenty of nasty pop-in and repeated slowdown too, and just overall this game is not very visually-appealing.

As for the gameplay, I feel like New York City Driver may be the first game to use this template that I’ve reviewed that actually takes to heart its issues and tries to do something interesting with them. Rather than forcing players through obstacle courses with sports cars that control terrible, New York City Driver has players driving vehicles they would largely expect to drive terribly, such as a school bus or a tow truck with a vehicle in tow. And these vehicles aren’t generally driving through an obstacle course, but trying to weave through traffic to reach the destination in time without taking too much damage. And, you know… this works. Unlike all of the other games to copy-paste the same design over and over again, I actually had some fun with this one.

That’s not to say there aren’t problems here, such as this game’s monotony - all of the game’s missions take place at night in a New York-esque city (minus any recognizable landmarks like Times Square or Brooklyn Bridge), making this game visually very repetitive. However, even here there are some amusing ads lining the streets to keep things interesting (For example, in one ad, an upside-down McDonalds “M” here becomes a W for “Weight: I’m gainin’ it!”).

Another frustrating element here is that the traffic in these levels isn’t scripted, meaning that you could end up getting a worse time in a level simply because the traffic was different in this run than it was in the last one.

Finally, this game’s $13 standard price is a joke, because this doesn’t even feel like a full game. It’s far too repetitive and simple, there’s no multiplayer, and it’s far too content-poor. Of course, we all know that $13 price tag is just a placeholder to make the game seem like a really good deal when it frequently goes on sale, but the bottom-of-the-barrel $2 price tag really seems like it should have been this game’s normal price, especially since this developer is re-using assets across multiple games.

In the end, New York City Driver genuinely surprised me. When I saw this was yet another game reusing the same assets from countless other games that all had the same problems, I was all set to write another copy-paste review. And to be fair, this game does still have those same problems, but by changing the context of what you’re doing, and making the obstacles you’re dodging traffic instead of unmoving objects glued to the ground, this becomes something else entirely. While this still isn’t a game I would recommend to Racing Game enthusiasts, those looking for a Driving Simulation game may genuinely enjoy this. Just do yourself a favor and be sure to get it on sale, the normal price is an absolute rip-off.

tl;dr – New York City Driver is a game that mixes elements of Driving Simulation and Racing games, with a focus mainly on the Driving Simulation side of things. And color me shocked, after countless times seeing this same gameplay template copy-pasted, this time the developer actually made something pretty enjoyable with it. It’s still graphically-ugly, loaded with issues, and the $13 price tag is an insult, but if you’re looking for a Driving Simulation game and not a Racing game, and can catch this game on sale, I think you’ll find it to be a fun but highly flawed experience.

Grade: C

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Ben, Ilya Zverev, Andy Miller, Exlene, Homer Simpin, Johannes, Francis Obst, Gabriel Coronado-Medina, Jared Wark, Kristoffer Wulff, and Seth Christenfeld. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}