By Robert Glashuttner
We get into our air taxi and whiz through a futuristic city. A programmer from Canada has been working on his dream game for more than three years, in his free time – squeezed between full-time job and family. The game came out a few days ago, and it has primarily become a homage to the 25-year-old game Crazy Taxi, a mix of car racing and stunt action.
Born out of nostalgia
Cassius John-Adams is a friendly, rather inconspicuous but motivated programmer with a permanent position in his early 40s when he has an idea: he wants to couple a favorite game from his youth with a cult film from the same time: “The Fifth Element” by Luc Besson from 1997, where Bruce Willis with the hover taxi horizontally and vertically through a metropolis.
“Mile High Taxi” meticulously captures the aesthetic of “Crazy Taxi”: angular 3D characters as they were standard 25 years ago, an obtrusive, never-ending fun-punk soundtrack and shrill one-liners spoken by passers-by . We steer our taxi left, right, up and down and work our way from one job to the next. Orders are indicated by brightly colored fields. If we drive there and stop briefly, the customer jumps into the car and our first journey begins.
Cassius John-Adams
Short game sessions
“Crazy Taxi” was originally released in 1999 for the video arcade, and there it’s about throwing money at short intervals over and over again. The game is therefore provided with a very short timer. So if we don’t finish our loads fast enough, the timer runs out and it’s game over – unless a coin is tossed.
Mile High Taxi works on the same game principle, which means that a session is only 5-8 minutes long on average. There is an easy mode here, but unfortunately the car also becomes significantly slower – which is quite boring. Optionally, you can still explore the city without time pressure or complete orders in a certain order. In addition, there are no other game options, and you feel like you’re done with the game after an hour at the latest.
Mile High Taxi is an example of what happens when you develop a computer game in a vacuum. Cassius John-Adams has delivered a solid indie game, but it lacks variety, inspiration, and inventiveness outside of the original “Crazy Taxi” meets “Fifth Element”. Also, those who aren’t familiar with these references won’t understand the game’s weird aesthetics and will quickly become annoyed by the ugly characters and their squeaky voices. Retro fans will revel in good memories.