Midnight Club: Los Angeles (PS3)

Midnight Club: Los Angeles is Rockstar San Diego’s first attempt at bringing their seminal 12 million selling franchise to the HD era; and boy, what a start it is. From its consistently smooth frame rate and stylish presentation to its varied soundtrack it’s hard to find fault with the racer.





The new title, taking place in Los Angeles does a great job at replicating the feel, if not the exact layout of the American super city, the game bungles you into a rubbishy vehicle nothing like the sweet ride on the box. From here, the game introduces you a rival (called Brooke) and it’s time to go. I picked the red Volkswagen Gold GTI with a grey door. Your rival set’s you the task of earning some reputation and then to come back.

With my little red beauty I made my beginning, heading down to the Sunset Strip to head off against some “boyz”. Vehicle models seem to be extensively crafted set against a respectable if static backdrop.

As you pull out of the car park into the sandbox, music blasts out from the in-car stereo. Featuring an extensive track list including a range of genres such as West Coast rap and Hip Hop through to Rock, Techno and Electronic. Music is taken from both superstars (like Snoop Dogg and Nine Inch Nail) through to some lesser known artists. Tracks are of good quality, though not all are exactly single-worthy. The only disappointment is that you cannot play tracks stored on your hard drive or on an external drive.

And as you pull out, what a sandbox. A beautiful sunset vista is cast above the ever so slightly modern city. With all sorts of alleyways and shortcuts through the courtyards of buildings, it’s a sprawling metropolis. The city is populated by a large but very similar looking group of people. They have the sole job of wandering around and diving out of the way when your only shortcut involves the pavement.

Use of in-game advertising if rife throughout Midnight Cub, players organise races using the latest T-Mobile Sidekick smart phone, the newest iteration of Apple iPod posters flare up and the city is populated with the odd Pizza Hut, Virgin Megastores, GameStop and more. However, it is safe to say that the level of in-game advertising is appropriately used, helping to render a more lifelike city and not distracting from the central game play. Also featuring a large motorway that flanks around the entire city almost like a moat, providing you with an entirely different type of race.

Nice graphical touches include the lights of other cars blurring if you change direction quickly, it’s a simple but stylish effect. The representation of the cars is brilliant with polygons in all the right places.

Unlike your conventional racer, Midnight Club is controlled using both sticks. Distinct to any other game in the genre, moving is used by pushing on the right analogue stick. Hold it down lightly to cruise at your own pace and push forward hard for racing. Pull back on the control stick to brake, it’s a great unique system that may be baffling to the casual newcomer and takes a good thirty minutes practise before you feel fully competent.





Controls are tight with cars having a fairly small turning radius. This gives the game a slightly arcade feel. With stunning vistas and some brightly coloured neon signs, it’s a good presentation. Players can use the L1 button and a quick left or right tap on the left control stick to shift the car onto two wheels - a skill that is useful when overtaking using the oncoming lane. The only real drawback to the system is looking behind, as it can be difficult to hit the square button when racing.

Races are organised by meeting a fellow street racer, matching their speed and flashing your headlights with a quick tap of the X button. The game zooms out to find the starting line and on the count of three its race time. Race routes are marked out using large steaming markers that can be seen over most buildings and are also on the mini-map down in the left corner. With no set boundaries, players have the option to attempt shortcuts through alley ways etc...

AI is fairly well designed; rival racers will have no hesitation in bumping you. I came to my demise in my second race where during the final straight my little Gold GTI was pushed into the back of a truck costing me first place.

Nice graphical touches include the lights of other cars blurring if you change direction quickly, it’s a simple but stylish effect. Players can customise their vehicle with a massive list of customisations. Whether it’s changing any of the car's vital parts such as the engine, the clutch or exhaust through to exterior parts including the addition of bumpers, changing your rides colour or adding some custom decals. Players can even set a custom license plate.

Police patrol the virtual metropolis and if you’re caught speeding they will attempt to persue you. Players can opt to pull over and incur a fine or they can try to get away. The police vehicles are fast and well manned, on a few occasions my puny Golf wasn’t up for the chase.

When you’re tearing around corners, trying to maintain that vital lead, the tension can really start to build. When you reach that level, the experience is flawless. Until you crash into another car and then, like your race, it’s over.

Late in the game the cars that get offered to you for purchase are staggering, they fly around the corners and blast down the straights. In fact at those speeds the only reason you will crash is the occasional dip in draw distance making some cars just appear right on screen. Not a good time to be driving on the wrong lane, cars trundling towards you, attempting to correct yourself but constantly aware that colliding with things in the lane drops your speed, and that it may cost you the race. It’s these sort of intricacies that help to distance Midnight Club from its rivals, particularly the yearly sales hog that is the Need for Speed franchise.





When I took Midnight Club online for some races, I found that the experiences was marred by some horrendous lag. When a good connection was found, however, the game was fairly good. - Fantastic use of controls
- Great, if sometimes static, graphics
- Wide range of car customisation options
- Good variety of music
- Balanced difficulty of AI
- Lag infested multi-player
- Inability to use your own music in-game
- With the standard control scheme, looking back is difficult
- At very high speeds there is some drop in draw distance A fantastic entry into the HD era for the Rockstar racer, with a better online service this is the first real rival to the Motorstorm title as King of PS3 racer. A great game and an essential title for racing mad Playstation owners.

In a word - Magnificent