Driver 4 Parallel parks in NYC

By Tom Bramwell Published 24 August, 2005

Less running; more, well, driving.

Some fresh information about the next instalment of Driver has been divulged by Germany's Official PlayStation 2 Magazine.

Firstly, the game is now officially known as Driver: Parallel Lines, with a sketchy release date of around March 2006 on PS2 and Xbox. Taking us to New York City in the 70s (complete with 40 licensed tracks from that era), Parallel Lines follows an 18 year-old guy called The Kid (or T.K); a new boy on the block looking to make his mark across the likes of Brooklyn, Manhattan, and The Bronx; each featuring recreated landmarks like the Empire State Building.

Various missions will be available in the open game-world, with most of the action based on driving rather than focusing on the badly received on-foot sections that DRIV3R had, with the ability to perform drive-bys part of T.K's repertoire; although when he does get out of the car, he'll benefit from a redone targeting system.

No boats are expected to feature this time round, but the AI is being ramped (sorry) up to make the drivers of other cars smarter, with three times more traffic than before, along with additional pedestrians wandering around too.

Side events, such as circuit racing, should be available to earn extra cash, which in-turn is used to help tune-up your vehicle or acquire new cars from a total of around 80. Mini-games are also promised, such as checkpoint races, destruction derbies and more. An online mode is said to be in the works for up-to eight players, as well.

Atari guarantees some more info and visuals around the next couple months, so keep an eye out.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (35) Latest comment 7 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • oceanmotion #1 7 years ago

    Let it die. At least make a next gen version instead of trying to squeeze it on current consoles while failing miserably

  • keano #2 7 years ago

    it sounds so promising yet tht is the reason y i am holding back on my expectations

  • dadrester #3 7 years ago

    proffesorlesser. any comment?

    is the new character a baddie at last... just doesn't sit right killing thousands of innocents when you're a cop.... just to stop some car/ drug smugglers (or whatever the story was)

  • McGeeza #4 7 years ago

    Note to Reflections - You lost. Give it up.

  • Blerk #5 7 years ago

    Parallel Lines?

    Doesn't exactly trip off the tongue, does it? :-)

  • Manticore #6 7 years ago

    Don't you mean P4r4llel?

  • theiceman #7 7 years ago

    nah. more like cr4p.

  • Mint #8 7 years ago

    Yeah....let's name our game after a Blondie album, woohoo!
    Tools.

  • jaspoid #9 7 years ago

    How very positive we all are today.. ;)

  • gizmo #10 7 years ago

    Where DO they get the ideas from. Genius.

  • Blerk #11 7 years ago

    Where DO they get the ideas from.

    Marketing department. If the rumours are to be believed. And looking at the name... I can believe the rumours.

  • deaner #12 7 years ago

    I liked the first two Driver games. I haven't got around to the third one. People keep telling me "it's alright. nothing special." so I haven't bothered.

    Still, if they time it right, a fourth title could sit quite well in the gap between GTA sequels.

  • Ulgen #13 7 years ago

    How come I'm not very enthusiastic about these news? Oh well, I just hope they've learned from the wrongs they did the last time...

  • Machiavel #14 7 years ago

    Crap name, but then we've amazingly seemed to stop questioning the Xbox360 hilarity.

  • Kiigan #15 7 years ago

    This year's naming gimmick seems to be using sub-titles instead of sequel numbers. Halo: Ass of Iron instead of Halo 3 etc (okay I made that one up). Think everyone is just ashamed to be putting out so many sequels?

  • Kiigan #16 7 years ago

    "Crap name, but then we've amazingly seemed to stop questioning the Xbox360 hilarity."

    Hmm you're right... I better keep an eye on that. In fact from now on I'm going to say "Xbox 2".

  • ruckus #17 7 years ago

    People who bought Dr1\/3|- should get this free as compensation - or would that be harassment?

    /just say no to zombie publishers...

  • Teeth #18 7 years ago

    "Marketing department. If the rumours are to be believed. And looking at the name... I can believe the rumours."

    Parallel Lines. Is that cos marketing are just a bunch of pretentious media-whore coke-heads then?

  • kalel #19 7 years ago

    "Parallel Lines. Is that cos marketing are just a bunch of pretentious media-whore coke-heads then?"

    Sounds about right!

    Three words Atari, three words:

    "DO SOME TESTING!!!"

  • deaner #20 7 years ago

    "Parallel Lines".

    Sounds like marketing executive thinking.

    One for each nostril.

  • dadrester #21 7 years ago

    Three words Atari, three words:

    "DO SOME TESTING!!!"

    according to someone i once met who worked for reflections driver 3 got loads of testing... just that so many known bugs were left in because of awful scheduling

  • marilena #22 7 years ago

    Bugs are rarely a result of bad testing. Usually, time runs out and somebody puts a stamp with "will not fix" on all bugs that haven't been fixed yet. Then they release the game.

  • Madder-Max #23 7 years ago

    "Parallel Lines. Is that cos marketing are just a bunch of pretentious media-whore coke-heads then? "

    Furkin LOLLERS!!!

    Two words that make me guffaw...."Atari guarantees..." notice that they only guarantee visuals.....maaaaan...

  • davyuk #24 7 years ago

    Aaah... the days I spent trying to get out of the boat whilst under fire, only to magically pop back into the boat, and get my arse shot off. And when the only way to leave the truck trailer when stealing cars was to fall into the road and lose most your health, even though you had no choice.

    Happy days...

  • PearOfAnguish #25 7 years ago

    As we speak, keyboard monkeys at Future are writing up 90% reviews while ad-sales calls Atari.

  • Baronen #26 7 years ago

    Oh, I'm looking forward to this one. Hopefully they will have learned from their mistakes, and I always thought the driving sections in all the previous installments were ace. Fingers crossed.

  • #27 7 years ago

    Marketing Stiff 1: "That 'other' game has done the 80's and the 90's, so... we can do the 70's!"
    Marketing Stiff 2: "OK, so what notable cars are there from the 70's then? This is a driving game after all..."
    Marketing Stiff 1: "Licenced music!!!"
    Marketing Stiff 2: "Sold."

  • tengu #28 7 years ago

    They should just have dropped the 'Driver' name altogether perhaps, erase the bad memories :(

  • Hunam85 #29 7 years ago

    i say lock the doors on the cars again, its better to shit in the drivers seat and not run around shooting things

  • #30 7 years ago

    Btcha it gets a name change and btcha it don't come out until late 2006.

    btcha

  • Pac-man-ate-my-wife #31 7 years ago

    People who bought Dr1\/3|- should get this free as compensation - or would that be harassment?

    People who bought DRIV3R should get a kick in the nuts as it obviously sold enough for them to warrant doing another sequel.

  • Diabeu #32 7 years ago

    somehow I dont believe Atari,

    btw I find Stuntman more enjoyable than Driv3r O_o

  • Dr_Actually #33 7 years ago

    Stuntman is the most underrated game ever - massively frustrating yes but also intensely satisfying when you beat a level - some brilliant design as well in evidence.

  • gamesb*tch #34 7 years ago

    Parallel Lines is one of the best albums evah. #reads article# Oh, there's another Driv4r game coming out... what... ever. Yawns. #coffee#

  • Madder-Max #35 7 years ago

    Wonder if they'll go for a cheeky sex mod thingy to compete with that other game......and then snort some more paralell lines
    Edited by 1 at 25/08/05 @ 10:15

  • gamesb*tch #36 7 years ago

    There's still a garage in Ha**ersmith with about a million copies of DRIV3R in it. Even though the UK public #cough# suckers #cough# bought loads of DRIV3R, Atari still thought it would make FFVII look 'unsuccessful' LOL