Crazy Taxi (GameCube, PlayStation 2)

Crazy Taxi
Developers: Acclaim Studios Cheltenham, Hitmaker Publishers: Acclaim Entertainment (US/EU), Sega (JP) Platforms: GameCube, PlayStation 2 Released in JP: November 22, 2001 (PS2), May 30, 2002 (GCN) Released in US: May 14, 2001 (PS2), November 18, 2001 (GCN) Released in EU: June 1, 2001 (PS2), May 3, 2002 (GCN) This game has unused text. This game has regional differences.

The GameCube and PlayStation 2 versions of Crazy Taxi was one of Sega's first games as a third-party publisher, with the port externally handled by Acclaim. This port is notable for eschewing the original voices found on the arcade and Dreamcast releases in favor of using voices from Crazy Taxi 2, a change that would carry over for every subsequent Crazy Taxi game containing the original character roster.

To do: RESOLUTION. This game's final framebuffer output is 640×512 on the NTSC PS2 versions, even though the actual rendering is done at 640×480 entirely. Should I crop out that blank space or leave it be? Document anything different between the PS2 and GameCube releases, as six months is quite some time between the ports. FMV handling is different between the American and Japanese PS2 releases, with the Japanese release solving a problem with the playback of the logos. Also see if anything is different in the European releases. Considering the date differences of the two releases, there's almost certainly not much in it, but it never killed to check anyway.

Unused Text

Unused Warning Text

Hidden in the PS2 version's executable is a warning concerning that this game should not be sold or used outside of Japan, a leftover presumably from the arcade version.

                  WARNING                 


      THIS GAME IS TO BE USED ONLY IN JAPAN. 

       EXPORT,SALES,DISTRIBUTION AND/OR       

       OPERATION OUTSIDE THIS AREA MAY        

       CONSTITUTE A VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL

       LAWS ON COPYRIGHTS AND/OR INDUSTRIAL   

       PROPERTY RIGHTS AND SUBJECT THE        

       VIOLATING PARTY TO LEGAL PROCEEDINGS. 

Regional Differences

Title Screen

US	Europe	Japan

The title screen differs slightly between the American and European releases compared to the Japanese release, with the copyright text modified to be a bit less verbose. This also demonstrates a problem with how the game renders - namely, its final output is 640×512 across all regions, despite the fact that the last 32 pixels on the bottom of the screen go unused in the American and Japanese releases.

Pause Menu

US	Europe	Japan

Strangely enough, the Pause menu is slightly different, with the following (relatively minor) differences in place between the US and European builds compared to the Japanese build:

• The highlighted text in the US/EU releases is a yellow color not unlike the background of the main menu, while the highlighted text in the Japanese release is red, not unlike the color in the logo.
• All of the options in the menu are renamed, for whatever reason. For example, Resume is labeled as Exit in the Japanese release.
• Likewise, Restart becomes Retry and Quit becomes Menu.
• The dash separating the Vibration text and the actual setting for it is removed in the Japanese release.