Judging from the trailers, I was hoping that Driver: San Francisco would be a decent game. The Driver franchise has seen more than its fair share of ups and downs, to say the least, so it really could have gone either way.

The first thing that jumped out about this one was that it looks and sounds a lot like Shaft meets Miami Vice. The music, the camera work, and the dialogue are good but it all feels a bit tongue-in-cheek. The graphics are far better than I was expecting but the environments are a bit lifeless at points and there’s a stark contrast between the level of detail in the characters and everything else.

But the thing that really matters, of course, is the actual gameplay and that’s where this game unfortunately has some issues to work out. The steering is a bit loose, the hand-brake is way too sensitive at times, and the game throws a lot of ridiculous obstacles at you. It’s still a fun game on the whole – it just feels like it could have been better.

With that said, I’d suggest waiting for this one to drop to $20 or less. It’s definitely one that’s worth playing. It’s just definitely not worth the full asking price.