For more on Driver: San Francisco, check out our full Driver: San Francisco review. Or, for more of the best Xbox 360 games for a 10 year old, why not try our Family Game Finder
Driver: San Francisco is a racing game that's taken a leaf out of Ashes to Ashes/Life on Mars, at least in terms of the storyline. You play as John Tanner, a cop who gets injured during a chase and ends up in a coma. The game you play, which sees you apprehending crooks, chasing down boy racers, and going undercover to bring down major kingpin Jericho's criminal cartel from the inside, actually takes place in Tanner's dreams, which means that many things aren't quite as they seem...
One of the main things that sets Driver apart from other games is the ability to "Shift". By pressing a button, your view will whoosh out of your car and into the sky, in an overhead view, where you can choose any other vehicle, at will, to take over. Taking on the role of the driver without the passenger knowing anything's changed, there are some funny conversations here, as you jump in half way through some awkward moments, and this forms a major part of the gameplay. Letting you jump into a bus, and swerve it across the lane behind you to block some pursuers, for example, there are many ways you'll be expected to put the shift mode to good use - but it can be a bit complex at times.
Actually driving the cars may take a while for less experienced players to get the hang of, even if they like driving games, as the cars in Driver handle differently to any we've come across. A lot heavier, and a lot harder to make turn, these cars have been designed to skid and drift at the first sight of a turn, so you'll have to wrestle to keep them driving in a straight line - something which may upset some players until they get the hang of it. The emphasis on "shifting", with some missions expecting you to manage two or three cars simultaneously may similarly prove too tricky.
Driver: San Francisco is fairly light on questionable content. The bad language is mild and infrequent - sh*t and a**hole are as strong as it gets, while there's also a reference to being "strung up by the balls". References to sex are again incredibly infrequent, with a few references to strippers, whilst violence is almost non-existent. While there are plenty of people on the pavements, you can't actually run any of them over.
As something of a rarity for an Xbox 360 game, Driver: San Francisco has a split-screen multiplayer mode, that lets two people play in three different modes - two which see you chasing down various baddies, and another, free roam, which lets you and a partner explore San Francisco and cause mayhem however you see fit.
Age Ratings
Format Reviewed: Xbox 360
