KMGR: "The Fast and the Furious: Pink Slip 3D"

Firemint, developer of one of the best driving games out there "The Fast and the Furious: Fugitive", finally deigned to follow up with another game. This time, there is no backstory, just 4 types of racing: street racing, canyon drift, drag racing, and police escape. You deal directly with pink slips (i.e. car title paper) now... You win, or lose. There is no "draw". You have to play through 16 different events (some events can be repeated to win other opponent's cars) to get the two "secret" cars (namely, Dom's muscle car, and the police car).

You start with basic subcompact imports, and go onto performance, sports, and eventually into exotics and muscle cars. Very few cars are good in several areas, so you will need to win almost every car in order to have a chance at later races. Each car is rated in 3 areas: drift, race, and drag. And there are over 30 different cars in eight categories.

Street racing is same as before, but the nitro has been decreased somewhat. While it recharges slowly, some cars have more nitro than others, and some cars have no nitro at all. Could be interesting when you race against some really fast but nitro-less cars with a nitro-capable but slower car.

Drag racing is basically upshift at the right time, and use the nitro at the right time. Speeds are a bit slower than it really is to give you a bit more time, as some of these machines should be quite a bit faster than it looks here.

Cop Escape is basically stay ahead of the cops, who will seek to smash you, and trap you. If you lose cop escape, you lose the car (impounded) and higher level cop escapes are really tough, with up to 3 cops who can do maximum speed after you. Do not treat this event lightly.

Finally, the "canyon drift" is a new event inspired by Tokyo Drift... On narrow canyon roads, you must drift and earn scores by continuing to drift and not hit anything. If you hit nothing and do uninterrupted drifts, your score multiplier will go up, and you will accumulate score much faster. The multiplier goes up to x9, so it's a huge incentive to drift flawlessly but it won't be easy, as you still need to keep ahead of your competitors. As long as you get to the finish line before your opponents you can win their car(s), but if you don't accumulate enough points as the event requires you can't pass the event.

There are four "levels" with four events each, in different order, and you need to finish one level before you unlock the next level. Drifting is probably the hardest, where going fast means going with style, and bouncing off canyon walls is not the right way to go at all.

The cars all look great, and the 3D engine is improved to add reflections off paint and windshields, and so on. The world also looks a lot larger, with items like freeway on and offramps, under and overpasses, narrow alleys, shortcuts, chicanes, and more. And what's more, each of the cars really do drive somewhat differently, even with just the keypad to drive. However, the paths are "fixed", no freedom to drive here and there or 180 U-turns and such this time. Still, you'll be too busy driving to care.

One complaint I have about the cop chase is there is no rear-view mirror or a "radar" so I don't know where the cops are, esp. when the sirens don't always work, and engine sounds are pretty horrible.

All in all, TFTF:Pink Slip 3D is one of the best driving games ever MADE for mobile, even surpassing their old Fugitive, though they lost the "free-form driving tracks" this time around, but gained drifting and drag racing. I'd consider that a fair exchange, and with 32 cars to collect, you'll be playing this for a while.

Overall score: 9 out of 10 (!)
Pros: lots of cars, 4 distinct events, great graphics
Cons: drifting VERY difficult even with right car, events can be repetitious