Talking of saving footage, where did the movie director mode go? That was one of the most fun parts of
Driv3r
and which really set it apart, as well as other aspects, from the most famous drive-and-be-violent game
I referred to earlier.
However, it's good that this time they've taken some time to redevelop your character when walking such
that you can turn him 360o rather than see him always facing forward and looking like he had
piles when moving about. This, again follows a lot in the footsteps of GTA. Alas, you can't jump but
at least you can crouch while walking which was something you couldn't do last time.
When it comes to the aural interludes you can use more than just the default game playlist by selecting
those tracks which you've already ripped to your Xbox hard drive, although those do start by including
cool '70s tunes such as David Bowie (Suffragette City), Blondie (One Way Or Another)
and The Stranglers (Peaches), so not to worry too much although the in-game tracks do seem to
repeat with alarming regularity; there's certainly not as big a variety as in... yes, you guessed it.
Overall, Driver: Parallel Lines is a disappointment. We've been to the 1970s before in
Grand Theft Auto III
and whereas Driv3r had its problems it did have a style to it that kept it well enough apart
from the competition and kept me coming back until I completed it but it just needed to fix the walking
and driving problems it had back then, which has been mostly achieved (c'mon, really, why can't he jump?)
Sadly, Reflections have failed to put 2 and 2 together to make '4' being the number in the series
where everything fits together perfectly. Instead, they've thrown that chance away and made an end
result that's too much of a GTA clone and, let's face it, nobody does it better than Rockstar for design,
implementation and just goddamn coolness!
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