Twisted Metal already made a stunning, triumphant return with TM Black on the PS2, having most of the original crew handle that game's development. However, the team would struggle to properly keep that momentum going, likely due to the game's director --David Jaffe-- leaving the team in order to pursue a huge project with Sony's full support that would become "God of War." An opportunity he couldn't pass up.

Thus, this is the most straight-forward continuation of where Twisted Metal 2 left off, even bringing back a lot of the characters. However, much of the edge from the original game seems to have been sanded down in order to provide a slightly cleaner, less explicit vibe. Jaffe has gone on the record to say that has always been Singletrac/Incognito's natural path when he isn't the one steering the ship. More family-friendly stuff that he doesn't vibe with at all.

Even so, the presentation is good! This was a launch title for PSP, and it really boasted how good games can look on that little rectangle back in 2005. Level design's great, really sporting that world tour feel again, and I love the overall character designs as they went with the comic book feel once again.

The overall gameplay, however, is kind of lackluster. Not awful by any stretch of the word but felt like a snail's crawl after the ultra-tight, fast, rambunctious nature of TM Black I was used to. They stuck to their guns and left most of the design unchanged from TM2 and Black, but the speed of the gameplay is just not that crazy. It could be due to the PSP's own limitations, though, I can't be sure. Even so, neat little game to this day. As an early PSP adopter, I thought it was awesome back then! These days . . . still not too shabby.