The first thing you’ll notice when you get into the game for the first time is how similar it looks to Grand Theft Auto. The mini-map and visuals look like that of GTA, but with a brighter tone. GTA is dark and gritty, while Drift City is bright and upbeat. Driving around the city and completing quests in the Drift City will remind you of the missions in GTA.

You’ll start out as level 1 in a horrible car with lousy stats, but the intuitive mission system will soon have you test driving far more powerful cars, in order to give you a taste of what is to come. Before you can enter the Battle Dome and race other players, you must complete several missions, which teach you the basics of the game (a tutorial of sorts). After the initial missions, the rest are optional but I highly recommend you complete them since they will allow you to unlock more missions in higher level cities and will give you experience. Missions give a lot more experience than races do. Sometimes, you will be asked to do delivery missions outside the main quest line, but these can be ignored unless you’re bored and want to attempt to set a time record.

You gain experience by completing quests or by racing against other players in the battle dome (The better you do in races, the more experience you gain). You could play this game almost entirely inside the Battle Dome, but you would miss out on the solid single player aspects of the game. Its best to balance your time inside and outside the battle dome. Race when you have friends online to play with and complete missions when you’re playing solo. After repeated play the races and missions will begin to look recycled. Overall, this is one of the more unique and enjoyable MMO games out there, after playing a dozen fantasy grindfests, Drift City is a nice change.