7. Crazy Taxi
Crazy Taxi is the third highest-selling game for the Dreamcast. But you might be surprised to learn that its sales are confined almost wholly to America. Of the 1.2 million copies it sold worldwide, it only mustered a paltry 115,039 copies in Japan. Reason? Because some games are only really meant to sell their specific market. Personally I'm surprised that the creators of Crazy Taxi were never actually sued by Paul Schrader, so close is the game with the latter's idea for a certain 1976 film starring Robert De Niro and Jodie Foster. But I suppose this turned out to be one of those situations where the cross promotion and knowledge of the film led to the sales of the game. Having said that, Crazy Taxi does not see you take on a character anywhere near the likes of Travis Bickle - rather its very simple plotline is to pick up customers and take them to their chosen destination as quickly as possible. It's something that might infuriate Grand Theft Auto fans, as this simple premise has been included as a mini game in that series for a while now, providing virtually nothing to the main plot. As you travel in the general direction of your destination, an arrow points "as the crow flies" to your goal - which results in some hilarious situations as you attempt to plow through that building. It would have made this game a lot easier I suppose if you could simply sandbox everything ala Battlefield 4, but times were tough in 2000, people needed to get where they were going and San Francisco (or whatever crazy city you're meant to be in) had a lot of "virtually challenged" streets. The game's simplicity led to its success - success which far outgrew the Dreamcast, with the game recently being re-released on Xbox 360 as part of a "Dreamcast Collection." Punk fans got an extra boost as two world class bands, Bad Religion and The Offspring, contributed music for the soundtrack - an accompaniment benefiting from enjoyment. Ultimately Crazy Taxi became another game to outlive the Dreamcast, although it's first incarnation was a DC exclusive, it led to several ported versions appearing on PC and even PS2. Interestingly enough, the game's sequel remains a DC exclusive, unless you count the horrible PSP port created in 2007 - which I don't - while its obscure third installment was one of the only halfway decent games released for the original Xbox (my apologies, in advance, to angry letters from Halo fans).