Driv3r (or Driver 3) is the third game in the series and the first Driver game on Playstation 2. Now we see Tanner in a high definition clear image and we start learning more about him and the characters that surround him including Jehrico.
Also in this incarnation of the Driver series there are many well known celebrities providing the voices of characters such as Michael Madsen voicing Tanner, Mickey Rourke voicing Jericho and Michelle Rodriguez voicing new villain Calita. As with Driver 2 you travel the world but unlike Driver 2 there are only 3 locations but with bigger, more detailed and more interactive environments in Miami, Florida USA, Nice, France and Istanbul, Turkey.
For the first time ever in the Driver series you can use firearms and enter certain buildings such as Tanner's houses and hotels. In these places there are health packs and weapons as for the first time you can be killed which adds a whole new dimension to the series as we start to leave the aim of the game being about driving wildly (although this is still a big part of the game) and focus more on Tanner as a detective.
In the marketing for Driv3r, they made this short promotional video and with the introduction of viral marketing and advertisement on the internet, this was a very good move because they could advertise directly to a new audience.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJh7r9sCpWk
Something you may have noticed is that they used cars based on real cars, real people and real locations. It is quite clearly marketed at a certain kind of audience and the use of real vehicles and people.
Driv3r opened up a new floodgate of creativity that would pour into the next game in the series Driver Parallel Lines with the interactivity, graphics and physics engineering of equal and better quality to Driv3r.
The game incorporated a whole new team of designers working alongside the designers of the two previous games and was released on the newer PlayStation 2.Working on a newer console meant recreating the whole design process for a newer game format that allows far more detail compared to the previous console.
Driv3r also paid close attention to the soundtrack and incorporated a lot of underground bands music such as Destiny by Syntax and Zero pm by The Bellrays. They picked music that gave Driv3r the vintage feel of the first 2 games but also had music that kept it sounding modern. Good idea right? The in game music you heard when driving around was primarily music that was made for the game but the music heard in the cutscenes was the music made by the bands. This is something they definitely carried on into their latest release Driver San Francisco.
The story of this game reveals a new element of Tanner and Jones's investigative style and shows the 2 of them (or Tanner at least) as mavericks and not playing by the rules to get results. It also shows a new level of ruthlessness in Jericho when he decides to take matters into his own hands and exterminates Solomon Caine (his boss) in an elevator.
Driver 2 was released in 2000 and had many new features.
In Driver 2 we see the main character as for the first time you can actually get out the car. Let's have a look at the character of Tanner who is the main charcter of the driver series.
This is driver 2's incarnation of Tanner.
Driver 2 also saw the introduction of main antagonist of the series, Jehrico, a ruthless hitman under the employ of crimelord Solomon Caine. In Driver 2 you work with Jericho after capturing him in Havana. Driver 2 also saw the introduction of a global map with parts set in Chicago Illinois USA, Havana Cuba, Las Vegas Nevada USA and Rio de Janeiro Brazil.
Solomon Caine (left) Jericho (right) as they appear in Driver 2.
The Graphics in Driver 2 were a step up from the original game especially in the cut scenes and the handling of the vehicles was also stepped up a level to deliver a slightly more realistic driving experience. As with the previous game all the cars are fictitious but based on real cars. Reflections (the game developer) also added some secret cars in locations as a bonus "easter egg".
Since 1999, the Driver series has been entertaining us driving game enthusiasts through the medium of carnage, twisty streets, bumpy streets and car chases and since it was one of the first video games I ever owned, I thought why not pay a little tribute and take a look at not only how the game has developed it's story but how it's graphics, characters and interactivity have developed across 12 years.
This video pays a small tribute to how it has changed and developed and you will notice differences between each game as well as showing a psp exclusive and a nintendo 3ds exclusive.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ind7ZQ6UpM
Now I'm sure many of you will have played one of the games from the Driver series at some point between 1999 and today, if not here's a brief outline of the game.
You play a wheelman, a driver if you will, and you complete missions which involve you driving very erratically all over the world (primarily in the states) to capture the baddies and save the day in a cloud of tyre smoke. Pretty simple and boring huh? But these games have developed into something much more as the game and story develop and creates a very engaging game series that has a loyal following of fans.
Let's take a look at the characters:
This is about as much as you see of the character in the original game.
This was obviously a low budget production game although it sold exceptionally and is still the best selling game in the series to date. The graphical capabilities were obviously limited by technology available at the time as the playstation was still a brand new product.
These games have become a world reknown phenomenon and have a place in a lot of our hearts (me included).
Released in 1999, Driver was a first of it's kind... Racing without racing. It featured the aspects of a racing game but without you competing with other racers for the most part anyway. You raced from mission to mission, took out the badies cars with your own. Also featured was the free roam aspect which was something that hadn't been explored deeply before Driver. You had the option of 'take a ride' which set you out in your choice of four cities to roam around at your own will. You could still get the police to chase you around the city you're in.
Driver had a pretty straight forward story line with you working as an undercover, maverick detective.
Well it's my first post, I know thank you I know you've all been waiting a long time. Anyway I better make this worthwhile and seem as though the theme is of future technologies in the media industry, I thought why not take a look at graphics.
Now we all know many teenage lads love their xbox's ps3's and so on and so forth and I'm no exception. I love my xbox, not as much as my guitar but I love my xbox. Now I'll confess I'm not Call of Duty nerd, in fact I'm awful at it, seriously like a 4 year old could beat me I am terrible and even though I do enjoy a game of FIFA now and then I've never kept up with brand. The most recent version of FIFA I have is FIFA 11... and I just happen to be the flukey-ist player ever.
But anyway enough about how awful I am at gaming and on to why I'm really here; Graphics. Since my first go on a Playstation back in the late 90's probably around the age 3 or 4, I have found Graphics fascinating and how fast they have improved is immeasurable. in just 10 years we have gone from really grainy, pixelated and plain awful graphics to graphics were you can struggle to tell the difference between reality and a CGI image. I'll show you a few examples now of how realistic graphics have become and how far they have come along.
So alas!! you can stop reading!! Well not just yet... Now you can!!!
Now this is the graphic obviously but look at the detailing! When I saw this as a thumbnail I was fooled by it and genuinely thought it was the real car.
This is the real car and as thumbnails it's hard to pick them apart.
Now as some of you may have guessed by this I am a car fan and for those of you who aren't, the car here is a Mercedes SLS AMG. For those of you who aren't interested in cars it's a very fast, loud and expensive car with doors you can't open in a multi storey car park. I know, not very practical huh?
