In a time where Microsoft is so focused on Forza, it might be hard to remember a time when they had other racing games on the market. First it was Midtown Madness, first released in 1999 on PC, then Project Gotham Racing in 2001. Each had their own unique style of play, with some crossover between locations and vehicles being the only thing similar about them.

For Midtown Madness, each game presented one or two open world locations to drive around in. You had the means of setting the time of day, the population of both AI vehicles and pedestrians, the weather, and police population. Cruise, the mode with no objectives, felt like the perfect sandbox to explore these locations. Though it wasn’t just a sandbox driving game.

Blitz mode had players finding their own routes to non-linearly placed checkpoints within a time limit. Checkpoint mode acted as marathon races, where the start and end positions were different. Circuit mode closed off roads to create street circuits for racing. With Midtown Madness 3, Work Undercover mode added a lot of themed challenges, whether that be a delivery driver, emergency services, stunt driver, and other vehicle-related jobs.

Project Gotham Racing, meanwhile, was a more career-focused racing series. One where, funnily enough, the racing was secondary to progression. Instead, it utilised a points system called kudos, where stunts such as drifting and two-wheeled driving would award points the longer that stunt was held. The locations of this series were all closed circuits, allowing a greater number of them to be included.

Kudos was the defining trait of Project Gotham Racing, with challenges also using it as the rating system. Speed challenges and driving accuracy challenges such as the cone challenge take on a different form when combined with the kudos system. Time trials avoided the system to keep things simple on the online leaderboards, putting the focus purely on racing skill.

The online modes for both also varied in later games. While Project Gotham Racing kept things mostly to racing, with a bit of custom content in creating races to share, Midtown Madness had a party-like atmosphere to things. Cops and Robbers was the only multiplayer exclusive mode in the first game, with Capture the Gold, Tag, and Stayaway joining the roster with the third.

Another mode added with the third was Hunter. One person is the hunter while everyone else is prey. The hunter must capture the prey, who in turn become hunters, until only one person is left. This mode seems to be remembered more from Project Gotham Racing, where in the fourth of that series it was known as Bulldog. Whichever game it was remembered from, it definitely needs to see a return.

Which brings me to the concept part of this article. With Forza, Microsoft already have two racing game series on the market. Motorsport deals with the closed circuit racing, while Horizon is the open world driving game. You might be thinking that Midtown Madness and Project Gotham Racing have no place against these two, but no. While true that both series have played some part in the creation of Forza Horizon, the two still have their unique quirks to them that would allow them to exist in the same space.

At the same time, it’s hard to imagine that both could exist alongside both Forza series. Instead of having a competition to see which is more popular, the systems of both Midtown Madness and Project Gotham Racing can co-exist in a singular game. So for this concept, I’m taking Midtown Madness 2 as a base and adding onto it. That gives us our two locations of San Francisco and London.

Both of those locations were also represented in Project Gotham Racing, giving some familiarity to fans of either series. However, a third location should be able to exist alongside those two. For this game, I’ll pick Tokyo. And not only because of how many people want Forza Horizon to head there for a game. San Francisco is the American representation, with London being the Europe representation. As such, the third location should be from another continent. Japan, as a widely recognised country, fits with the other two locations.

Cruise will be the mode for exploration and pure freedom. No events marked on the map, no challenges within the world, just a pure driving experience. The sandbox elements would be here, allowing the choosing of weather, time, traffic and pedestrian density, and police presence. Doing so can be done while in the world, so no needing to quit out to change things. Same goes for vehicle selection, too.

Each location would be larger than how they appeared in Midtown Madness and Project Gotham Racing, with a lot of representation for each of the cities that just wasn’t possible back then. For London, the likes of Hammersmith, Peckham, and Stratford would be represented. With San Francisco, Marin County can see some actual representation rather than the single looping tunnel it was in Midtown Madness 2.

While the real names of boroughs and areas would be used on the maps of these locations, several areas combined would make up a Kudos League district. These districts would be for the classification of events, with each district marking a section of the career that is the Kudos League. Here, events of both the racing and challenge variety will be played. Just like in Project Gotham Racing, the kudos is vital to progression. With enough kudos earnt, a new district of that city opens. Completing all districts of a city will unlock the next.

Kudos will also work as currency, allowing the freedom of unlocking new vehicles that are each split into classes. There’s no customisation of a car’s stats or class, but there will be an even spread of vehicles across each class. While you only start out with four E-class cars, each district of the Kudos League can be completed with any class. The higher the class of vehicle, the more expensive it is. Vehicles can be personalised with colours and a basic decal editor.

The online and arcade modes would include regular racing along with kudos racing, with Blitz also being an event type of both. For online, Cops and Robbers, Capture the Gold, Stayaway, and Hunter would all be available. Each of those events will be restricted in area to one of the Kudos League districts, otherwise the play area would be too large.

For a name, it needs to be tied to one of the existing series while also representing the other. That way, people are aware that this is a game from a series that they remember. And despite me using Midtown Madness as a base, I’m attaching this game to the other series. This concept shall be named Project Gotham Madness, and may it become real at some point in the future. Or just remade collections of both series.

Images Taken From:
Midtown Madness 3… | Blurdecai
Project Gotham Racing (PGR4): Online GameNight | RetroGaming Dragon 384
Midtown Madness 2 London Crash Course | Blurdecai
Project Gotham Racing 3… | Paragleiber