Midnight Club 3 is the third installment of Rockstar's famed Midnight Club series and easily the best edition to date. Previous installments suffered from the lack of licensed cars, poor gameplay, and no depth of customization. MC3 aims to change all that by including licensed cars, car customization from looks to engine and incredibly fun and addictive gameplay.

MC3 has two main single player modes to choose from when you start off. There's arcade mode where you can just have fun around the city with a car of your choice or do some races without much of a story. The other mode is career mode which holds the main part of the game like unlocking cars, parts, tracks and other customization options. While arcade mode is fun, most of the enjoyment of MC3 is in career mode. It works by putting you in a city, where you can go to tournament locations, look for other drivers and challenge them, or go to your garage to make some upgrades. The whole style is very reminiscent of Need for Speed Underground, but MC3 has a better layout for the city, which makes racing far more enjoyable. Also the amount of licensed cars in MC3 is a force to be reckoned with and the sense of speed you get from this game is unmatched

It's All About The Bling
The presentation for MC3 is very well done and is perfect for this kind of racer. The menus are easy to navigate and get you to the racing action quickly. Also, your HUD gives you all the information you want, and the story is moved along quite well by cutscenes between important races. This helps the continuity of the game and gives you an incentive to keep playing. The whole game has a sense of style to it that is really true to the import racing scene but that is somewhat lacking in other games like NFSU. There are no incredibly odd characters or anything too strange that doesn't fit in when you look at this game.

Cars Have To Look Good
The graphics here look really well done for a PS2 game and the cars look fantastic. The game sports some speed effects to give you that real sense of speed and the amount of cars that seem to pass by your view while racing is quite extraordinary. While there are some framerate drops from time to time, these are too few and far between and you'll be hard pressed to notice them too much when going at it with some of the racers in town. The crashes in this game are also pretty fun to look at and the cars do sport paint scratches and other details after a crash. The cutscenes that move the story along are of decent quality and effects like sparks and other details work together to make MC3 a great visual experience.

Turn It Up!
I have to say that the sound in this game is phenomenal. From the crashes to the squealing of tires and the soundtracks, all the sound effects feel authentic and compliment the game in a great way. The highlight of sound is especially the soundtrack, which has a good mix of different genres and does not get repetitive easily. The voice acting is decent and features your Mechanic in a Spanish accent and other racers around town during cutscenes. Despite all the sounds being great, the soundtrack really steals the show in this type of game and really helps the mood of jumping from race to race.

But How Does It Handle?
Gameplay in MC3 is extremely fun and addictive. There are various cities for you to explore and you can take part in city races, challenge other racers to a series of races, or participate in tournaments. By winning races, you earn money and make progress on the game's plot. Needless to say, there's a lot to do and unlock in this game and it should easily take you much more than 20+ hours to finish it leisurely. The controls are great and responsive and the various maneuvers you can make give you great control over the car's direction. The game also sports some "powers" you can use that include roar, zone, and agro. Zone helps you by slowing down time so that you can maneuver through heavy traffic a little more easily. Roar makes all cars in front of you move out of the way and can be a great weapon in hampering your adversary's progress by having cars thrown at it. The last power, Argo, makes your car able to crash into other cars and throws them out of the way with little resistance and is sort of like a "tank" mode. All these powers are useful and you'll need all of them to finish the game successfully.

Just driving through the expansive city environments is very fun and it also pays off since you can discover secrets to unlock hidden parts or cars. MC3 is a very compelling "RPG" of sorts for street racing fans and I just can't say enough good things about the gameplay. When you add the multiplayer aspect to the package, this game will keep you interested well beyond the many hours of the single player experience. Even the multiplayer is very well done and races with various people are not affected when the host leaves the game. Just don't forget about your girlfriend though, she's still there....

The Finish Line
Overall, I really enjoyed playing this game. I thought it was challenging, a lot of fun, and a game that catered to my every need as a racing fan. While this game does not have accurate physics like GT4 and Forza, it does not try to be an accurate racing simulation. You can pick the subtle nuances of it fairly quickly and it's really a battle of reflexes as to whether or not you do well running through the city. I definitely recommend this game to any racing fan or any avid gamer period and I can guarantee you'll have a lot of fun.

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