It's your first time playing Crazy Taxi. After just a few playthroughs you already have the layout of the map down, at least of the areas you have gotten to in that time. Maybe not entirely memorized but you understand the world. I'd say even after just one single playthrough you could have no problem remembering all the locations you drove through like a madman, guiding arrow or not. The trolleys, the beach, the church, the bus terminal, the Pizza Hut, etc. If you can't remember the route you can at least approximately guesstimate those locations in your mind. It's a living world. That's why we can at least approximate locations across the map and that's the main problem with Mile High Taxi a futuristic-Fifth Element take on Crazy Taxi with skyscrapers as high as the eye can see. I've played this for over an hour (stretched out over 3 months since it first came out in March) and I can't name you a single location in this game. It's all high-rises and weirdo billboards (the bad kind of weirdo, sadly) and they might as well just be solid pillars of concrete for the entire world completely lacks locations, structures: a personality. Compared to the world of Crazy Taxi this feels like an unintended commentary on the horrors of a bland dystopian future cityscape. Where everything is exactly the same.
I could probably ignore the bland, yet overall nice looking(ish), world had the gameplay been of any value. Like it’s inspiration, it can be fun zipping around the world going as fast as humanly possible while picking up passengers but the entire game is way, way, WAY too easy. There is absolutely no challenge or risks you can take here. Unlike Crazy Taxi where you are planted on the ground and can only go left, right, forwards, and backwards, here you are in a flying car and can go literally anywhere. Really not okay that you can just clip through other cars here. This game needs WAY more actual obstacles (not just signs you can plow right through without a scratch) and it needs a health bar. Every time I've played the normal/endless mode I usually just let the timer run out because I'm so bored from flying around for so long without anything getting in my way. You have to go around buildings, sure, but with how small and condensed the map is and with nothing else causing you trouble you’re basically driving in a straight, boring line. The fact that this isn’t Steam Early Access is a legitimate crime. There is potential but it still needs so much more work.
I could probably ignore the bland, yet overall nice looking(ish), world had the gameplay been of any value. Like it’s inspiration, it can be fun zipping around the world going as fast as humanly possible while picking up passengers but the entire game is way, way, WAY too easy. There is absolutely no challenge or risks you can take here. Unlike Crazy Taxi where you are planted on the ground and can only go left, right, forwards, and backwards, here you are in a flying car and can go literally anywhere. Really not okay that you can just clip through other cars here. This game needs WAY more actual obstacles (not just signs you can plow right through without a scratch) and it needs a health bar. Every time I've played the normal/endless mode I usually just let the timer run out because I'm so bored from flying around for so long without anything getting in my way. You have to go around buildings, sure, but with how small and condensed the map is and with nothing else causing you trouble you’re basically driving in a straight, boring line. The fact that this isn’t Steam Early Access is a legitimate crime. There is potential but it still needs so much more work.