Crazy Taxi was one of the first new Sega franchises to appear on the ill-fated Dreamcast. It received accolades for its fresh arcade style gameplay back before the turn of the century. Fans loved the intense driving, special driving abilities, and reckless driving through an open city trying to bring passengers to their desired destinations.

After releasing two Crazy Taxi titles on the Dreamcast, Sega had to pull the plug on the system and then moved the third installment onto the Xbox where it wasn't as warmly welcomed. Even though Crazy Taxi 3 introduced new tricks and abilities, the Xbox crowd wasn't in the mood for craziness and instead went back to their green machines.

For all those who have waited to relive the past Crazy Taxi titles get ready for Crazy Taxi: Fare Wars. The PSP installment of the franchise includes both Dreamcast Crazy Taxi titles with some brand-new extras to make things a little more crazy. Sega has added several new modes into the PSP version such as ad hoc multiplayer, mini-games, replay saves, and finally customizable soundtracks.

Crazy Taxi is all about the money. Literally. Players will have to race around a city making money from passengers. Like a real life taxi cab, there's a set regular rate but this since this isn't real life, you can make things a little crazier. By putting your car on two wheels, performing intense jumps, or taking turns incredibly tight you will earn some big cash from the passengers. If you drop off a passenger incredibly fast you'll get a huge reward for being so fast and get extra time added onto your day. Once the time is up, you'll be brought to a menu where passengers and total income will be tallied and you'll then be given a license and ranking. The game offers several gameplay modes where you can race for a preset amount of time or as long as you can keep time on the clock.

Essentially Crazy Taxi and Crazy Taxi 2 are exactly the same from the Dreamcast and Arcade. Nothing new has been added to them gameplay wise in the overall single-player experience outside of the customizable soundtracks and replay saves. Luckily, Sega also added some multiplayer modes. If you have another friend with a PSP get ready for some crazy action with some ad hoc battles. Sega added three multiplayer modes including a Time Trail mode, C-R-A-Z-Y mode, and Head to Head. However, not everyone knows someone with a PSP. Luckily Sega thought about you as well. Players can play Time Trail and C-R-A-Z-Y with only one PSP and pass it back it forth.

Being able to control your Taxi is essential to being a successful driver. The PSP does handle this taxi well, even though it will take some time getting use to. The PSP's analog stick handles incredibly well and feels excellent. Once players get the whole R-trigger, X, and circle buttons mastered you'll be cruising around town picking up passengers with no problems; unless the problem is stopping where you’ll notice that you don’t stop as quickly as you hope. This also plagued the Dreamcast version of the title. Braking has also been a little loose and never felt like when you hit the brakes you stopped firmly but instead slid a little further then you should. Since this is a direct port of the first two Crazy Taxi titles the problem remains.

Graphically the games still looks good. The game is bright and still has some nice details in them. Surrounding buildings such as churches or baseball stadiums looks great when pulling up to them. The game does hit a snag when you get into incredible speeds. The surroundings won't mix and will look a little smudged.

Since the game is a direct port of the Dreamcast titles, all the same problems remain untouched. Braking, repetitive gameplay, and some graphical mishaps still haunt this version. However, Sega does add in some new content with the multiplayer modes and customizable soundtracks. Crazy Taxi: Fare Wars gives you two solid titles with new multiplayer content at a decent price point of only $30. Crazy Taxi is a fun game and will keep fans of the genre happy with this compilation. This is a solid handheld title with an impressive features list, despite its problems.