Driver 2

aka: Driver 2: Back on the Streets, Driver 2: The Wheelman is Back
Moby ID: 3578
Note: We may earn an affiliate commission on purchases made via eBay or Amazon links (prices updated 3/23 11:05 AM )

Description official descriptions

Tanner is back as an undercover driver, this time trying to survive amidst an international war between American and Brazilian gangs. The action takes the player to Chicago, Las Vegas, Rio and Havana, all of which depicted in detail. There are several improvements over the first game: the cities now also have curved roads instead of just right angles, some missions allow to exit the vehicle and move around on foot, and there is a multiplayer game mode.

As before, the gameplay involves driving a car around the streets of the four city locations to complete the 37 main story missions. New to this instalment, the player can now get out of their car and carjack another one in order to switch vehicles when their current one has taken too much damage.

Driver 2 also features some preset challenges and a Free Driving mode to explore the different cities at one's leisure. The new multiplayer split-screen feature includes four game modes: Take a Ride, Cops'n'Robbers, Checkpoint, and Capture the Flag.

Groups +

Screenshots

Promos

Videos

See any errors or missing info for this game?

You can submit a correction, contribute trivia, add to a game group, add a related site or alternate title.

Credits (PlayStation version)

183 People (149 developers, 34 thanks) · View all

Game Concept
Development Director
Project Management
Programming Team
Additional Programming
City Art Team - Manager
City Art Team - Chicago
City Art Team - Havana
City Art Team - Rio
City Art Team - Las Vegas
Additional Artwork
[ full credits ]

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 69% (based on 21 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.5 out of 5 (based on 42 ratings with 3 reviews)

Now this is a car driving game!

The Good
First of all, there have been some improvements in this game, first is the ability to get out of your car and go on foot!, so then you can go steal another car!, second is that you can now play any mission you want (though you will have to complete it first though), unlike the original Driver in which you had to go through the Undercover mode (where you can play the main missions) over again. And not only that, but fans of "Starsky And Hutch" are in for a treat, Antonio Fargas (who played Huggy Bear) does one of the character voices in the game!

The Bad
The graphics are a let down. Although there is a bit more variety in the graphics, the Playstation obviously just can't keep up with this game, the frame rate is often low and the glitches are too noticeable. Not only that but it looks like that the draw distance has been reduced from the original Driver (which means more pop-up)

The Bottom Line
If you liked the original Driver, then you will love this (however the graphics problems might turn some people off)

PlayStation · by Grant McLellan (584) · 2001

This is the best game for Playstation.

The Good
This game is about the only playstation game that i have played and actually liked. One of the best additions to this game is the fact that if your car is damaged, or you have felony, then you can simply get out of your car, and hijack another. You can't do this while you are being pursued by police. For playstation it's got pretty good graphics. There are a whole host of cars from which to choose from. There are 4 cities, which gives you nearly endless amount of rode to drive around in. This game is definitely better than the first. There are a bunch more missions in this one than the one before. Unfortunately when you finish the story missions there is not a whole bunch more that you can do other than driving games and roaming around endlessly on the streets of Chicago, Vegas, and two other massive cities. It is a great game.

The Bad
The worst thing about this game is the lack of things to do. The driving games are very boring. Other than that there are no other problems that I saw.

The Bottom Line
If you own the first one, then you have to buy this game. Even if you don't own the first one, you should still buy or rent it. It is really the best game for Playstation.

PlayStation · by Jester236 (34) · 2003

Could be so much better....

The Good
Playing a bad guy is always fun, even if your a good guy pretending to be a bad guy. The graphics are probably this games best feature, at night, the lights 'bleed' when you look around and when a car crashes, you can see the damage. You can break individual headlights or break lights, or all of them if you like, however you can't do true physical damage to the cars such as lose a wheel. The traffic is nice, it uses turn signals, but that's really the only positive thing you can say about it.

The Bad
This game is horribly flawed. While the cities may be very, very large, the amount of pop up you get and the distance you can see is terrible. Being able to only see about a dozen car lengths in front coupled with only 5 cars being the most you can see on screen leaves you dodging the magical cars that leap onto the screen. The FMVs are terrible, not only are the animations stiff and hardly human-like, it is obvious that the voice acting and script were done after the animations as the mouths hardly even move, yet along try to shape words. The sound doesn't always sync with what's on the screen and the subtitles usually don't match the dialouge. The music is quite bad, there is one track for each city and is very bland, a semi recognisable midi tune or some dynamic chase music would have not gone a miss. The cars all sound pretty much the same, the only real difference is the sound of the horn and that is just a slightly different pitch to the others. All the cars you can drive are similar in appearance (all most all are sedans) and quite similar in performance. The game follows the great tradition of cheating by making any car you chase or any car chasing you much, much faster than you and always shrugs off accidents like they didn't happen, this becomes glaringly obvious when the police chase you. Even if you're in a police car, they will catch up to you even if you have a huge head start. When they ram you your car will spin off, out of control and take heavy damage, usually with you pinned against a wall, the police car, however, has only been slowed down and has spun so it is lined up to hit you again, which it does at an impossibly fast speed, over and over. The game is completely linear and almost every mission has a time limit, while some missions make sense to have a time limit, such as racing to catch the ferry before it leaves, it is very annoying for a lot of the other missions that have a time limit for absolutely no reason. I prefer the method in Grand Theft Auto of only some missions, usually involving explosives, having time limits. The traffic is a complete pain, they drive at a speed that is just as fast as walking, going any faster than this will get the police after you. The traffic is completely oblivious to everything going on around them, they wont bat an eye at someone driving down the wrong side of the road or the car that is blasting down the road much faster than themselves or the person who just rammed them, they will just go about their business, maintaining speed and using their turn signals. This may have been different if the horn did something, the horn only makes pedestrians scatter, but they scatter on their own, defeating the purpose of even having a horn. There are dozens of places in the game where you can fall through the level and crash the game, this points to a rushed release.

The Bottom Line
I don't recommend this game unless you think flaws only make a game better. I suggest you go play World Scariest Police Chases or The Italian Job instead, similar games that have far better execution.

PlayStation · by Evil-Jim (145) · 2002

Trivia

Re-release

Soon after the initial release, Infogrames released a limited edition package containing a revised version of the game as well as some merchandise in a cardbox, not a CD case. The limited edition was even more expensive than the original game.

The reason? Raising the cashflow and the fact that the first version of Driver 2 had many glitches (stuttering graphics at most) which were then removed. Apparently, the programmers needed some more time to fine-tune the 3D engine...

Analytics

MobyPro Early Access

Upgrade to MobyPro to view research rankings!

Related Games

Driver / Driver 2
Released 2004 on PlayStation
Driver
Released 1999 on PlayStation, Windows, 2008 on PSP...
Driver
Released 2000 on Game Boy Color
Driver '76
Released 2007 on PSP
Pro Race Driver
Released 2002 on PlayStation 2, Windows, 2003 on Xbox
Driver: Renegade
Released 2011 on Nintendo 3DS
Trainz: Driver Edition
Released 2006 on Windows
Bus Driver
Released 2007 on Windows, 2011 on Macintosh
TOCA Race Driver 2
Released 2004 on PlayStation 2, Xbox, Windows

Related Sites +

Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 3578
  • [ 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 Brolin Empey.

Additional contributors: Jim Fun, phlux, DreinIX, Zaibatsu, Patrick Bregger, TwoDividedByZero, Victor Vance.

Game added April 4, 2001. Last modified March 25, 2024.