The Simpsons: Hit & Run

The Good
I liked the fact that the game has an insane amount of replay value, as you can explore the levels at will and can look for the many things hidden throughout the levels, such as wasps, gags and hidden cars.

I also liked the fact that many of the characters from the series are in the game and you can play as the main characters such as Homer.

I liked the plot from the game as they put some thought into it and made the most of the characters.

The graphics are okay for its time, and the voice acting is on top form as it is the original cast, and there are lots of quotes from the show.

The music is also okay but there is not too much to say about this.

The Bad
I noticed that there are some major bugs, sometimes the car can fly off the road for no reason, or sometimes you can fall through the ground and get stuck.

Some of the missions are repetitive and the game will ask you to do many of these similar missions over and over in different levels, such as race to point X before Y does, or Collect X from Y.

I also noticed that the camera is a nightmare to control, sometimes it will move, sometimes it will not move, or not let you judge jumps appropriately thus leading to many frustrating falls and making missions harder.

After a while on a level, the quotes will get repeated over and over and can get quite annoying after a while.

The Bottom Line
I would say that The Simpsons Hit & Run is a great game that any Simpsons fan should have in their collection.

The Good
Every landmark, character, situation and object you can think of that has graced the Simpsons TV show gets to make an appearance here. As advertised, the game places you in a virtual Springfield (divided in 4 zones) and you are free to visit such places as Camp Krusty, Moe's Tavern, Mr. Burns mansion, etc. as well as meet all of the characters from the show in one way or another, even the obscure ones you don't see anymore like Dr. Nick (Hi Nick!!) and yeah, all of them are voiced by the show's full cast. On top of that, events from the show that can't be replayed in the game appear in collectible trading cards, and you can also collect different costumes for each of the Simpsons to wear (ie: play as Bartman instead of regular Bart). Heck! There's even an Itchy and Scratchy episode to be found if you clear the game at 100%!

In short if solely for the "has everything you've ever seen in the show" factor, Hit & Run is a Simpsons fan's wet dream... unfortunately that's all it's got going for it... I guess I should give credit to the designers for adding a way to automatically spawn the cars you own in your location (by using the payphones around the game) saving you the hassle of actually having to replace them or getting them back at your garage but it's really the only improvement over the GTA3 formula I could find.

The Bad
You would think that it takes a really determined effort to make the Simpsons suck and that nothing could probably accomplish such a feat, right? Well don't underestimate the resolve of the guys at Fox Interactive, who didn't believe they had done enough damage with Road Rage (a Simpsons-themed Crazy Taxi rip-off) and now deliver us a Simpsons-themed GTA3 rip-off. I'm still wondering why nobody has sued Fox's ass off over this but anyway, onto the game itself:

Hit & Run makes no effort to conceal that it's a GTA3 clone, basically you just drive around the gameworld doing "missions" for assorted NPCs that somehow tie up to a stupid plot tied up with the release of the brand new Krusty-Kola and some gigantic cybernetic bees that are supposed to be "spy cams" (because really, nobody notices giant cybernetic bees and they make perfect spies). As each of the Simpsons, you go up to a certain NPC (marked in your map) looking for clues to the mystery at hand, and they retort: "Sure I'll help you! But you have to get me to X place in 3 seconds!" or "No I won't help you unless you beat me in a race around the city" or similarly retarded stuff.

This shows us the game's basic problem: which is that since the gameplay is completely forced upon the license (because "Hey! GTA3 sells! And the Simpsons sells! So if you put them both together...") the end result is a collection of meaningless and idiotic sequences in which the player has no hope of ever getting involved into. Plus, since it's a family title, you can't really have the violence and extra gameplay features you had in GTA3, so the game is only left with races, races and lots of races. Everything in Springfield is settled with a race apparently and if you think no amount of innane races with impossibly difficult time limits and cars that explode at the smallest touch can bore you then I suggest you give this title a try. Similarly the plot in GTA3 was more or less linked with the missions and the gansta theme of the game, Hit & Run on the other hand has nothing Simpson about it's plot or gameplay premise.

But wait! It doesn't stop there! The game is also a Mario-clone! As you often need to jump around destroying the robotic bees and collecting giant floating gold coins so that you can buy all the costumes and cars in the game (which are often required for doing certain missions). Believe me, nothing seems so out of place in a Simpsons game as jumping around from building to building collecting giant gold coins. And that's without mentioning the hidden trading cards, special jumps, cars and assorted collectible crap a-la Pokemon.

Finally the graphics left me cold. For as much flak as it has taken, cel (or toon or flat or whatever you call it)-shading has its uses in videogames as shown in the new Ninja Turtles games, and I can't help but think that Hit & Run would have looked much better with it. As it is now, the game is your average unimpressive 3D title, made all the worse by the cartoony flat-colored Simpsons world which really cries for cel-shading.

The Bottom Line
Plagiarism at it's worst, as it trashes both a kickass license and a kickass gameplay concept in the same game. Think of all the bad parts of GTA3 magnified tenfold and brutally shoved in a gameworld that has nothing to do with it, sprinkled with some low-grade platformer crap and you'll get a sense of the mess that Hit & Run is.

The only use for this game would be as masturbatory material for Simpsons cultists or as a nice way to get your kid off your back if you have a retarded and easily-fooled kid that's bugging you to get him GTA but you are afraid that he'll grow up to be a hooker-shooting gangsta.

The Good
It's been a long time since I played a Simpsons game that was actually, in some way or form, entertaining. The last one goes all the way back to the arcade game developed by Konami. Since then, nearly every game based on the series has been total rubbish, especially most recently with Simpsons Wrestling and the Crazy Taxi rip-off, Road Rage.

So, I'm glad to say that Hit & Run is a return to form for the franchise. The humor comes think and fast, thanks mainly to the addition of nearly the entire voice cast plus an original story. The game stays true to the show, with a collection of characters, places and items from some of the best episodes of the shows long run appearing at some point during gameplay.

The game itself plays fairly well. The controls are simple and easy to use, certainly not as complicated compared to any major racing game when it comes to driving your cars around. Mission objectives are also fairly basic, and for the most part they don't take much time at all, but the side quests will keep you going for much longer, such as racing against the clock and other racers, or collecting the many bonus items and wasp cameras.

The Bad
Despite the solid engine under the hood, there are plenty of bugs that spoil the experience, including the usual camera problems or strange errors where the characters get stuck in certain situations for no reason at all.

And though the game is fun to play for the most part, the objectives are the same all the time, with little originality during the later levels (the same 'find this' or 'do that'). It can get boring quickly as you work through the game, which is a real shame considering what could have been done.

The cut scenes aren't all that crash hot either, simply filling time more then moving the story along. Sure, looking at the cast in 3D is nice, but I would have liked some original 2D artwork by the cartoon animators far more.

The multiplayer element could have also been worked on a little more. It's fun for a short time, but it would have been nice to see a co-op mode or deathmatch mode ala Mario Kart, what with all the cars available.

The Bottom Line
It isn't perfect, but compared to the everything else that has come before it, Hit & Run is a much better game to build upon for the future of the Simpsons franchise. Fans will love the humor and references to previous shows, and the extras will keep you going for a little longer. I'm looking forward to see what Vivendi can do next.