The Simpsons: Road Rage

Moby ID: 5569
PlayStation 2 Specs
Note: We may earn an affiliate commission on purchases made via eBay or Amazon links (prices updated 3/23 8:19 PM )
See Also

Description official descriptions

Mr Burns has taken over Springfield's transit company and replaced the buses with nuclear powered buses; not only that but they also cost a lot to ride. But the people of Springfield won't accept this and decide to try to take back the transit company from the evil corporate hands of C. Montgomery Burns.

Play as your favorite characters from The Simpsons and race around Springfield picking up passengers and getting them to their destinations as fast as possible. Think Crazy Taxi meets The Simpsons.

Groups +

Screenshots

Credits (PlayStation 2 version)

219 People (187 developers, 32 thanks) · View all

Producer
Associate Producer
Int'l Production Director
Int'l Production Specialists
Director of Marketing
Product Manager
Public Relations
Package Project Management
Package Art and Design
Package Illustration
Mastering
Documentation
Documentation Layout
  • The Big Idea Group
Customer Quality Control
[ full credits ]

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 64% (based on 30 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.5 out of 5 (based on 48 ratings with 1 reviews)

Not too bad, but not worth my time

The Good
Well, Simpsons Road Rage is actually a good game, considering that it's a Crazy Taxi clone. The graphics are very cartoonish and true to the Springfield world. The details in each character are done very well, including the voice acting. I especially like Ralphie's responses to being picked up by a taxi ("Can you take me home? A leprechaun tells me do burn things."). I love just cruising through each part of Springfield. You can drive through Downtown, the Power Plant, the Dam, and more. The selection of cars and characters you can drive is impressive. Just about everyone you can think of (and some you didn't) has a car you can select. Very cool. Multiplayer is a blast, but I would have liked to have seen more gametypes, like tag, or team play of some sort. Single player was great, but kinda sort.

The Bad
Well, The cars are a little hard to drive, because their response is almost too good. Getting out of corners is sometimes very hard and there's no "Back on Track" option to take you back to the road. The graphics could have been a little more detailed, too. Almost all the houses were one solid color on the sides, and one solid color on the roof. Also, the trees on the boundary of each level are flat and lifeless. I can understand a developer wanting to have a high frame-rate, but some stuff like the houses and trees are a little ridiculous. Also, unlocking characters can be a little difficult. At one point in the game, you need to earn $250,000 to unlock the next character of neighborhood. That way too much, considering I only earn about $6,000 on a single run. Like I said above, single player could've been a bit longer with a more in-depth storyline. Honestly, I think that a storyline was thrown in at the last second to make a little more interesting.

The Bottom Line
When I bought this game, I thought that it would be cool to have a mix of Simpsons and Crazy Taxi. Now I only play it because of it's multiplayer games. I would recommend it only of you are a die-hard Simpsons fan, or if you played Crazy Taxi so much that you something new. All in all, not bad, but not really worth my time.

Xbox · by Mullet of Death (592) · 2004

Trivia

Lawsuit

On December 4, 2003, Sega of America filed a lawsuit against Fox Interactive, Electronic Arts and Radical Entertainment, on the grounds that The Simpsons: Road Rage is a carbon-copy of Crazy Taxi.

Open World

The game was initially designed to be one open world instead of being split into levels like in the final game. However, months before release, the developers realised that retail PlayStation 2 consoles had much slower disc drives than the development units they had been sent, and that they wouldn't be capable of sufficiently loading the game map. In order to keep the game the same across all 3 platforms, all versions had the map split into levels, and paths that would have led to a part of a different level were blocked off with unexplained piles of scrap metal.

Character Select screen

The game's character select will play a short "preview" for each character when they are being highlighted. These preview consist of a short animation and a line of dialogue. The final version of the game uses the same animations as the beta, but almost all of the dialogue was changed for no known reason.

Removed Passenger

The PlayStation 2 version features a passenger in the Evergreen Terrace level located in an alleyway outside Smithers' apartment. This passenger will always ask to visit Smithers' apartment, allowing players to exploit the passenger and earn unrealistically high scores. The Xbox and GameCube versions removed this passenger, likely due to balancing issues.

Game Ending

All three versions of the game end with a cutscene of Mr Burns admitting defeat and warning the player that they "haven't seen the last of Monty Burns". On the PlayStation 2 version of the game, this is immediately followed with the credits. The Xbox and GameCube versions of the game have an additional cutscene before the credits where it is revealed that the game was actually being played by aliens Kang and Kodos, who exclaim that it has become tiresome and proceed to "insert the ultimate game disc", a copy of Pong.

Game Builds

Based on the game ending and removed passenger, the PlayStation 2 version of the game seems to be running on an earlier build of the game as opposed to the Xbox and GameCube versions.

Analytics

MobyPro Early Access

Upgrade to MobyPro to view research rankings!

Related Games

Rage Road
Released 2020 on iPad, iPhone, Android
Road Rage
Released 1996 on PlayStation
Road Rage
Released 2017 on Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Road Rage 3
Released 2001 on PlayStation 2
The Simpsons
Released 1990 on Dedicated handheld
The Simpsons
Released 1999 on Dedicated handheld
The Simpsons
Released 1991 on DOS, Commodore 64, 2012 on Xbox 360...
The Simpsons
Released 1990 on Dedicated handheld
SingStar: Catatonia - Road Rage
Released 2016 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3

Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 5569
  • [ Please login / register to view all identifiers ]

Contribute

Are you familiar with this game? Help document and preserve this entry in video game history! If your contribution is approved, you will earn points and be credited as a contributor.

Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Grant McLellan.

Xbox, GameCube added by Kartanym.

Additional contributors: Terok Nor, Sciere, Deleted.

Game added January 11, 2002. Last modified March 27, 2024.