Inspired by Sylvester Stallone’s hit movie DRIVEN.
- NA release: 27th March 2002
- EU release: 3rd March 2002
- JP release: N/A
- Developer: Crawfish Interactive
- Publisher: BAM! Entertainment
- NGC Magazine Score: 60%
- Mods Used: Widescreen Hack
The first direct movie tie-in for GameCube, and it’s about a film I’ve never heard of. Driven was a personal project for Sylvester Stallone, who produced, wrote and starred in it. It was about an up and coming racing driver that started losing focus, so a champion is brought out of retirement (to help him out). It was supposed to be about Formula 1, but due to behind-the-scenes secrets, Stallone had to settle on “Championship Auto Racing Teams”.
The game is, naturally, a racing game, but there are a few modes inspired by scenes in the film, and a story mode that follows the plot of the film, using the various modes throughout. The most unique mode is blocking, where you have to get behind a teammate and prevent an opponent from overtaking. You have to stay close to your teammate, so you just can’t crash into your opponent (despite having a special crash camera, the crashes are extremely underwhelming).
A few scenes in the film are car chases in cities, and you get to play out these as well, dodging traffic, which is decent fun. There’s also a mechanic where if you don’t hit anything, you’ll enter “focus” mode and improve your top speed, acceleration and steering.
I really don’t like how it handles, though, cornering is very stiff and the opponents are near-perfect, making each mission extremely difficult. While some of the modes are interesting, it’s not very nice to play.
Fine
While Story and Blocking modes add a little variety to the mix, it never manages to really get going – there’s just enough speed, and it’s infinitely better than the PS2 version, but it still fails to grab you by the throat. More like a tap on the forearm. Shame, because there’s the nucleus of a good idea here.
NGC Magazine #68
Remake or remaster?
The blocking mode could be implemented into F1 games (if not already done).
Official Ways to get the game
There is no official way to get Driven.
Europe
Japan
North America
GameCube Games by Date
2002: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2003: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
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2005: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2006: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
