Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator Review (Xbox Series X|S)

It feels like the Xbox Series X and Series S generation has marked a resurgence for simulation games, with the likes of Police Simulator: Patrol Officers, PowerWash Simulator, Lawn Mowing Simulator and the incredible Microsoft Flight Simulator all proving extremely popular on the Xbox Store in recent years. And when the announcement trailer for Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator racked up well over a million views a few months ago, it looked like developer Simteract and publisher Nacon had another bonafide hit on their hands.

That may well end up being the case, but as things stand from a gameplay perspective, Taxi Life still needs a lot of work in order to sit alongside the greats of the genre. The good news is that it mostly does the basics well - the driving handles decently enough, and the simple gameplay loop of transporting passengers to their destinations is an addictive one. You're judged based on how accurately you follow the rules (such as stopping at red lights and sticking to the speed limit), and there are plenty of tools at your disposal including a GPS, a cruise control button and a rear view camera to help you park. Your passengers will sometimes even engage with you in light conversation, and you can earn XP by being friendly with them during the journey.

The problem is... you sometimes won't feel like being friendly during those journeys! It all starts off pleasantly enough, but you soon realise that the AI drivers in this game can be absolutely infuriating. It's not uncommon for drivers to plow into you for no reason (as well as other AI drivers), change lanes at the last minute, skip red lights, and simply sit in the middle of a lane or roundabout without moving. Some of this might be by design, but the majority of it clearly isn't meant to be happening, and the downside is that it can result in damage to your car and your customers' "patience" levels - not to mention your own sanity.

That's not to say there's no enjoyment to be had in Taxi Life: A City Driving Simulator. As mentioned before, the gameplay has an addictive quality to it, and it all takes place within a massive slice of Barcelona (286 miles to be exact) that features some fairly nice graphics despite the evident pop-in. The traffic dies down considerably at night as well, which is when Taxi Life starts to feel like a much more relaxing and immersive experience. Landmarks around the city can be visited in order to earn XP, and there are always loads of potential passengers waiting for a ride - including special "Challenge" passengers who allow you to break the rules by speeding, for example. Plus, you can unlock special Perks as you continue to level-up, and buying more Taxis means the "management" tab becomes unlocked, featuring the ability to hire additional drivers and assign their work schedules in order to generate more revenue.

But again, we can think of some downsides with the huge map that immediately stick out to us at launch. Even on Xbox Series X, we've noticed a very inconsistent frame rate depending on which part of Barcelona you're visiting, and it's not an exaggeration to say it feels like it goes from 60FPS at best to around 15FPS or lower at its absolute worst. Pedestrians in the city can be humourously irritating as well, often leaving you guessing as to whether they're going to moonwalk across the street or not, and the game's GPS feature feels like it sometimes takes you on an overly long route to reach certain destinations.

Is any of this truly game-breaking? Well, for us, we're still having a surprising amount of fun despite the obvious drawbacks at launch, but those who were hoping to treat it as a super serious simulation will undoubtedly be disappointed right now. It's a game that's in desperate need of a few patches to clear up some of the jank, and although the foundations are good and we can see a lot of potential, there's little doubt that it's struggled to live up to the pre-release hype.