Crazy Taxi is a game all about speed—no time for any lore when the average time a passenger spends in your vehicle is under half a minute. I just need to know that you wanna go to the KFC, not why you're heading there in the first place.
Sega is somewhat trying to pump a narrative into its attempt at reviving the series, Crazy Taxi: World Tour—a game I'm not totally sold on yet based on a one-hour hands-on I had at Gamescom. I'm don't know how good a story you can get out of a bloke committing several traffic violations—though then again, you could argue that's every Fast and Furious movie ever—but Netflix clearly sees something in the zaniness as it's one of the many Sega projects the company has decided it wants to adapt.
As reported by Variety, in Crazy Taxi's case, it'll be taking the form of a comedy movie written by Dan Gregor and Doug Mand (responsible for Naked Gun's 2025 reboot). On the production side, it'll be handled by Original Films and Toru Nakahara—both of whom also produced all three Sonic the Hedgehog movies along with the Knuckles and Sonic Prime television shows.
"We couldn't be more excited to continue our longstanding relationship with Sega and bring Crazy Taxi to life with our partners at Netflix," a statement from Original Film's Neal H. Moritz and Toby Ascher read. "This film is for anyone who's spent hours behind the wheel of a yellow cab on their Dreamcast, with the music cranked up, smashing through everything in sight just to make the next fare."
Now I am one of those people, but I'm honestly a little unsure how you can get a full 90 minutes of action out of someone with a painfully 90s updo picking people up and dropping them off about 20 meters down the road. Movies have certainly conjured up more material with less, though, so who knows?
That's not all Sega and Netflix has up its sleeve, either. It also has yet another animated Sonic television series in the works, along with a movie adaptation of Stranger Than Heaven. You know, that game that isn't even out yet.
I feel like we've been on a relatively decent hot streak for actual good videogame movie adaptations over the last few years, though I fear Netflix's penchant for turning absolutely anything into a straight-to-streaming romp may careen us right back into mediocre territory before long.
