I can always appreciate a sim game that offers a zen-like form of escapism that lets me exit the hustle and bustle of conventional games. I have played so many high-octane action games, grindy RPGs, and mini-game heavily challenge fest that all I wanted to do was unwind. Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator, which came out on PlayStation 5 at the perfect time to scratch that itch,and offers all the things I was looking for at its core.
A game where you place a Taxi driver, drive around the city, have a pleasant chat with the locals, taking a break to gas up, I mean it doesn’t get more relaxing than that. I love a good leisurely drive too, which made the prospect more appealing. And, for the most part, it delivered on what I expected. Despite that, there was a lack here I couldn’t overlook, both in offering and technical limitations.
My journey to Taxi supremacy in Taxi Life started with a relatively pointless tutorial that offered very little of the experience that was to come. One of the game’s smartest moves was placing options both in first person and on buttons. This means that despite the game trying to teach you how to monitor things like the dashboard, handbrake, blinkers, and more, the player can easily switch to other camera angles and access all that regardless.
The Tutorial then asks you to drive a course, park in spots exactly, and learn proper driving etiquette. This was when behind the wheel became annoying to me. One wrong move parking properly in the box causes you to have to retry a stage, something I found out much later in the real game has no adverse effects. Since it was a chore to tell the depth in first person I switched to third-first. I never looked back after that.
One of the oddest features, something you will learn during the tutorial, is a collision that is overly exaggerated. Running over even cones will cause the screen to shake, your car to jerk forward, and might even force your back wheels to rise off the street. Now, don’t ask me how this is known, but this isn’t the reaction a car will have. On the street, you will see these a lot, but at least crashing into another car feels more at home for this reaction.
…Since it was a chore to tell the depth in first person I switched to third-first…
Barcelona is a bucket list city for me, so having a game set there was pretty cool. It is a modern city, but Taxi Life offers a small microcosm of a few districts. Driving the city was a highlight of the experience, with there being a love of the location put in there. Whether it was the middle of the day driving along the beach or driving back roads at night, there was always cause to take in the sights. Historic locations also heightened the experience.
Once out in the city, you will settle into a pretty simple routine. You drive the streets looking for fairs to pick up, you pick them up, and then you drive them to their destination. It’s that simple! Of course, this is a sim so it is not THAT simple, you need to monitor your gas gauge, your clean gauge, and your damage gauge to make sure you don’t break down both these are relatively easy to rectify should you need to so they don’t feel like chores that get in the way. The game also has more settings to ratchet up the sim elements but as I said, my goal here was to relax so those weren’t for me. It’s important to note, that my biggest issues were never with setting anyway, but we are getting there.
During each drive, you might get minor tasks that help keep your customer happy. These can be as simple as cleaning your window or turning the radio on to a conversation with your fair. Most conversations are the same so it can get repetitive, but it allows a break from the monotony, something one might imagine is true to life. Weirdly you can’t just ‘pick up’ fairs as you drive though, you need to go into your map and set one. These trips can range from long to quick, with some unlocking as you progress. They reward you with money based on the trip length so obviously, a long trip is… obviously… long but more rewarding.
…Driving the city was a highlight of the experience…
Taxi Life puts heavy emphasis on obeying the rules of the road too, with customers having a patience gauge mostly affected by following the rules of the road. The rules though barely matter. It was shocking to learn that running a red light, hitting a car, smashing a pole, illegal U-turns, or even hitting people, carry very small fines that even one fair makes up for and then some. Furthermore, leveling up is mostly geared at reducing how much you pay for things and one tree deals with fines, even making up to two tickets just go away.
Hitting a person carries the worst penalty of 50 euros, but that is small as it is the only fine that will automatically stop your trip. At no point though did this hurt my bottom line. In most cases, customers have a very high tolerance for these shenanigans, putting up with almost everything on normal. You might lose out on a tip if you do this often, though I have not received a tip for following the rules so it felt like it didn’t matter. Beyond that, these fines only occur in front of a cop car and that cost is deducted right from you, without cops feeling the need to stop you.
What solidified my rule-breaking person though was the AI which was… Not good… to say the least. My first few fairs saw me stop at red lights, which the game tells you you’re supposed to, only to consistently be rear-ended by drivers. They then lay on their horn like you’re the bad guy. It wasn’t Grand Theft Auto after all so I had no recourse but to move on. This happened so often, even to other AI drivers, that the decision was made to abandon being a good driver if nobody else had to be.
AI doesn’t get much better with pedestrians either. Their animations often don’t sync up with how they move making them hard to predict, though these are mostly impactful if you’re a psychopath with no desire to drive on the road. Where this matters is most crosswalks where AI often gets caught in a loop. At many points in the game, a pedestrian started crossing only to stop, and then head back, in one clunky animation. Others fully cross, only to walk back across, then again, then again. Drivers have similar confusion, as many struggled to start driving at a green light, or not understanding how to make a turn. It’s so consistent and so predictable, not to mention draining, as you dive deeper into the game.
…though these are mostly impactful if you’re a psychopath with no desire to drive on the road…
Like all sims, the big hook in Taxi Life is the goal of creating a taxi company. Completing this revolves around buying new cars that you can then hire drivers and assign them to. The interesting part about this is all of these cars are also drivable with you and have stats beyond just speed. Some of these cars will be electric, others gas, which offers diversity to them. You can also upgrade cars you own with parts, though depending on how you play, it is hard to notice an increase in acceleration in traffic.
These offer a much-needed goal to the MASSIVE amount of repetition to the game. As I stated above the game loop is simply with minimal deviation. There is a list of games in this genre I have played, and the issue here is the loop is also limiting. There is no life beyond being a taxi driver, and that can be a daunting thing. These rewards at least offer earned diversity, but you will need to take a lot of fairs to start earning them and by the point I did earn them I wasn’t sure if I wanted to keep driving.
All of these issues however pale in comparison to the performance of the game, at least on the PlayStation 5. Taxi Life has framerate dips very frequently, dropping to maybe 10 or lower. There is also constant stuttering that during any fair is a nightmare. Since the game places such importance on the rules of the road, having your car hit a tree because of stuttering going into a turn makes it hard to enjoy. I wish I could say that was the worst of it there but at points, the game would stop for a second before going. At that too was a constant occurrence. I imagine, given the nature of the game, these issues are present in all versions, but I can only speak to its state on PlayStation.
Verdict
It’s a major bummer that the game had so many back-end problems because I was enjoying my time cruising the city. With stuttering, framerate dips, and full stopping, I am left wondering if the repetition got to me, or if it was the constant bombardment of technical issues that made me want to park my car and find myself another career.
There is an enjoyable game here, buried, somewhere, wanting to break out, but it’s not highlighted even before you factor in those issues. The AI was bad and often hindered you, and there wasn’t much more than what the game promised on a base level. If you’re looking to unwind for an hour or two, here and there, Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator might fit the bill. It’s hard to say though, with many simulators on the market that are easier to recommend than this one.
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Review For PlayStation 5, Also available on Xbox Series S/X and PC
Developer: Simteract
Publisher: Nacon
Release Date: March 7th, 2024
You are a taxi cab driver on the streets of Barcelona. Take fairs and make money to build up your taxi cab empire.
Pros:
+ Barcelona
+ Simple mechanics
+ Relaxing
Cons:
- Poor AI
- Performance issues
- Little incentive to follow the rules
- Repetitive
- Little to do beyond the core loop
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Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator
