The Simpsons: Hit & Run I had this game many years ago on PlayStation 2. At one point I did reach the final level. Roughly half way through the farthest I gotten previously. I went this route because it's very unclear if this Simpsons game ever going to come back. There's an fan HD version of the game. It had a surprisingly huge modding community something I learned recently.
Not only I'm going to review this Simpsons game. I'm also going to do my personal ranking of the Big 3 Simpsons games. If you're an huge Simpsons fan you already know which Simpsons games they are. This is a review I wanted to do for a long time. I figured my wife didn't even notice I fully played this for the first time.
The Simpsons: Hit & Run (2003)
A lot of people viewed this as an GTA clone. Yes you get to explore a few maps as a couple Simpsons characters. You get to do missions including side stuff. There's a lot of vehicles you can drive as well. You also can have the police chasing. I strongly felt it's a vastly different experience from that franchise. Same with most Saints Row series for that matter.
The game is broken up into seven levels. Two of which you replay two members of The Simpsons. There's three maps with a few variations. I recently learned there exists a mod connecting all the maps. Even knowing they're broken up into a few maps. Each map is a rather nice size allowing you to explore em. You get to see a lot of references to the show.
You do a good variety of missions to keep things interesting. Levels 1-6 has Ralph, Milhouse and Nelson doing the regular races. They are replaced by zombies in Level 7. I confess some of these races were challenging to complete. You also can do secret missions that's never the same person. Seven different famous Simpsons characters has these missions you can do.
You also can find seven cards in every level. Destroy twenty camera wasps that will get trickier in later levels. There's also buying outfits as well as vehicles. There's also finding gags then do em all. You have to do so much to do for an 100% completion. Yes all seven levels has their own 100% completion I checked plenty of times.
You can go inside many iconic locations from the show. Such as school, Simpsons' house, Moe's Tavern and a few others. I really gotta say the audio as a whole truly fantastic work. The voice overs are quite rememberable. Just get use to hearing a lot of them especially among failing the missions. I also wanna point out this is the PC version.
I did run into some spots suddenly you gotten sent forward hard. This made a couple missions more difficult. You get to see a surprising amount of Springfield. A lot of your favorite Simpsons characters around town. The cards you find are direct references to the show. I love you can use phone booths to swap out vehicles.
Most missions does allow this but other missions makes you use particular selected vehicles. Also you don't want those to get destroyed because it's failing missions when you do. Every character you play as on foot can jump or kick things. There's some platforming but mostly a driving game. A rather fun driving game at that.
If you collect all the cards you get two major things. Among getting them all for a level is a new track for the racing multiplayer mode. The other prize is a secret cut scene. You go to levels where Comic Book Guy's shop presented. You go inside to claim your ticket. Then you got to drive to the movie theater to talk to an employee.
Among doing so you watch an Itchy & Scratchy cartoon. It's kinda sad they barely show The Itchy & Scratchy show on The Simpsons anymore. There's also seven well hidden vehicles you can drive. You can enter other people's vehicles. It's more of having someone else driving you then you stealing their vehicle.
I did notice a few select things not colored properly. This is rather minor I still wanted to point em out. When you see Snake's icon within missions. His trademark jacket is the wrong color. Everyone knows his jacket is blue. Also Donut Homer's head the wrong color as well. In the game it's the usual Simpsons yellow.
The actual color is more of a light brown. Most outfits are colored correctly though. Look I know some details aren't going to be full accurate to the show. I know someone else likely pointed that out too. The difficulty spikes is a little unbalanced. I still say it's more fair than you expect. Most missions in Level 7 are virtually the same thing.
You drive to the Nuclear Power Plant to pick up nuclear waste. Then you gotta safely drive it to the school's playground. This is where the aliens' spaceship at. You allow vehicles with nuclear waste to get sent up to explode. Most of those had some famous Simpsons characters involved. I'm not trying to cause waves or anything.
They did make each other stand out more than simply do the same thing a few times in a row. Which is technically what you're doing that late into the game. Also it was true to the game's story. The aliens secretly using humans as characters in an intergalactic sitcom show. This is how Buzz Cola got brought into all of this.
You really felt like you're in the show the entire time you're playing. Considering this came out on PS2, Xbox and GameCube the same dates is mind blowing. The PC version came out a few months later. The controls are some of the finest I ever experienced within licensed video games. It's as close to perfection as insanely possible.
The soundtrack with the sound effects are quite amazing. Some missions may come off a little cheap at times. Like the vehicle you're following gets a head start while you're outside the vehicles. Some of these time limits are so strict. When you get the best vehicles a lot of these missions are much easier. You still can easily screw em up.
The actual look of the characters is really solid for it's time. Another surprising feature it has not a lot of people knows. Depending the date your game has a few holiday looks. I also liked you can skip the ending credits. I gotta say the jokes lands incredibly well. Honestly, I am in all honestly deeply impressed with this Simpsons game.
My standards for licensed games as a whole already high. Well the decent ones the not great games is more what you expect. Obviously I don't have high expectations from those. I will say this has to be one of my absolute favorite licensed games I have ever played!!! A game that truly made me quite happy as I'm playing it.
God I miss days of gaming feeling that. The Simpsons: Hit & Run is among the greatest Simpsons things ever made!!! Of course it's not just me saying that. Most of the fan base believes it's the greatest Simpsons game ever as well. In a little while I'll break down my ranking. I will say you really aren't living until you play this!!!
Ranking the Big 3 Simpsons Games
3. The Simpsons Game
I played two versions of this Simpsons game. More familiar with the PSP version. Which I still owned in my physical game copies portion of my gaming collection. The Simpsons Game is a quite a decent Simpsons game. I just wish the full focus was on the show. Also there's some learning curve with playing as two characters in most the levels.
There's no question this looked the most like the show. They did find plenty of ways to spike things up. Like giving The Simpsons family powers. I felt a good amount what it tried to do. Simply done better in licensed LEGO games. A particular song kept playing at the end. It's a great song no disrespect towards that song.
When you keep failing the final boss fight. You start to get a bit tired of it. Plus the song kept going afterwards as well Personally I felt that song was simply overused in the game. It would've been easier to justify the theme song instead playing during these portions. I will give some credit it's a fun licensed game.
2. The Simpsons Arcade
The original Simpsons game that holds up amazingly well. I know a lot of people aren't crazy for beat em ups. But this was a rather fun beat em up game. You play as The Simpsons with the possibility of all four characters on screen at once. This game followed the first TMNT Arcade game. Sure some characters like Smithers was colored wrong.
This also was very early in the show's run. Considering that it was amazing what Konami came up with. The learning curve isn't The Simpsons Game strict. The goal in every level is beat everyone up. There's some crazy boss fights including Mr. Burns. Personally my favorite boss fights are Krusty Balloon and Giant Bowling Ball respectively.
This Simpsons game always meant a lot to me. Still among my favorite licensed beat em up games ever!!! I actually prefer the Japanese version. Which has more weapons to use. But the big reason is simply more Simpsons characters shows up. This may seem like a minor thing. These two changes made the game more awesome than the US version.
1. The Simpsons: Hit & Run
You shouldn't even be remotely surprised what number 1 is. This Simpsons game truly has everything you possibly could ask for. You get to fully explore three maps filled with plenty of surprises. A rather fun process for an full 100% completion. The insane amount of references to the show. Even comparing characters you play as in all three of these Simpsons games.
Homer, Marge, Lisa and Bart respectively. All of them were way more fun here. They are given a lot of voice overs. Both Homer and Bart gets six outfits compared to everyone else's three outfits each. You also get plenty of rememberable vehicles from the show. You get to collect cards that also references the show.
Level 7 is clearly inspired by Treehouse of Horror episodes. All three of them had similar portions that's all done incredibly differently. This was my favorite among those by far. A house with the famous Homer Shinning joke written all over I loved that!!! Controls were absolute perfection with the soundtrack including sound effects very well done.
Conclusion
In all honestly the other two Simpsons games has some stuff over Hit & Run. Sadly quickly pales to what Hit & Run brings to the table. This is exactly how an licensed Simpsons game should be done. You are getting so much in an era before DLCs became a major part of gaming. Right now on GOG, there's over 20,000 votes on their wish list for The Simpsons: Hit & Run.
Currently The Simpsons Game doesn't even have a thousand votes. Well that's how I felt after I fully played The Simpsons: Hit & Run. My comment on it's page currently has 25 votes excluding my own. I would say this game is among my most wanted to date now. It's ridiculous an Simpsons game this damn good isn't available on consoles neither Steam or GOG for that matter.
Words can't properly explain how I felt on that. I'm appreciating people at an Abandonware website keeping lost games including this classic alive. Abandonware is essentially games that's not currently on any services. It's unclear if they ever going to become available again. GOG helped a lot of games escaped this fate. Games like this are on the verge of extinction.
Which would be a huge shame. This Simpsons game is truly impressive in every possible way. A very fun driving game that makes every Simpsons fans feel like they're in heaven. I could easily see this selling well right now. Especially not many Simpsons games came close to it's greatness!!! This game is simply so good you really need to play it before you die.
I could say everything imaginable. But I'm very sure by now the internet said virtually everything else I could've said. This is among the greatest GTA open world inspired games ever!!! I'm aware this could bring the Apu controversiality back up. They could simply make a newer version. Then recast Apu with someone whose Indian while changing some of his racist lines.
I felt doing this would be a step into the right direction. Personally those racist lines shouldn't be in the game. I know it's just an handful of lines Apu says. Then again he barely on the show anymore. His most recent camo was in the intro of Treehouse of Horror 35. Which is quite easy to miss since he's there a few seconds.
Other than that it's already set up well for a newer version. People going to expect "better graphics." I am expecting an easier method to swap stuff on the fly. There's a few locations to swap outfits at. Then again the phone booths aren't too far from each other. I felt swapping out outfits or vehicles from a new system could spike things up.
It does sound a bit ambitious. You should hear some of their ambitious mods. Some of which completely transforms Hit & Run into other cartoon shows like SpongeBob Squarepants. So I felt if modders can pull that off. Then a feature to make it easier to do that quite doable. The Simpsons: Hit & Run is a true timeless classic that can't be properly recreated.
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