CRAZY TAXI TECHNIQUES

Tower Records/KFC area — map and notes about customer selection

ASCII Map

|      |                 
|      '-----------------.
|                        |
|                        |
|      .----------.      |
|      |          |      |
|      |          |    6 |
|      |          |      |
|      |          |      |
|      |          |      '------------.
|    7 |          |                   |
|      |          | 5                 |
|      |          |   .--------.      |
|      |          |   |        |      |
|      |          |   |   kfc  |      |
|      '----------'   '--------'    3 |
|                                     |
|        4                            |
'------------------------------.      |
                               |       \
                               | 2      |
                               |        |  tower
                               |        | records
                               |        |
                               |       /
                               |      |
                               |    1 |
                               |      |

Customer Notes

One of the customers in this area may send you backwards; one is pointless to take when it's a certain color.

  • Tower Records drop-offs
    You want to pick up Customer 1 when it's yellow (to the Heliport) or green (to the Baseball Stadium). Pick up 2 when it's orange (Heliport), yellow (RB Station), or light-green (Baseball Stadium). (Go wherever you have a lot of customers waiting.) Most of the time, I try to reserve these customers for times when there aren't any good choices at the Levi's Store.
  • KFC drop-offs
    Customers 3 and 4 are always present, always red, and always go to the Church. Customer 6 is always present, yellow, and goes to the RB Station. Customer 7 will go to the Heliport when orange and to the Baseball Stadium when light-green, but does not always appear. Customer 5 is always present and always orange, but may send you either forward (to the Heliport) or backwards.
  • backwards customers
    Customer 5 is always orange, but will sometimes send you backwards to Popcorn Mania or FILA. Information detailing how to choose this customer correctly can be found under Additional Notes below... There's another customer you need to watch out for here. Never pick 2 when it's red to go to KFC, the shortest (and most worthless) trip in the game. Wasting this customer's potential to take you forward for an easy +5 second bonus is a very bad trade. (Can you drive from here to the Baseball Stadium or even the Heliport in 5 seconds? Don't think so...)

Additional Notes...

  • When Tower Records is your destination, initiate a Braking Crazy Drift early on and earn a lot of tip money as you skid to a stop against the far wall.
  • It's a little trickier to Crazy Drift to a stop at KFC since you have to be more careful about oncoming traffic, but it can still be done if you stay out of the left lanes until you reach the intersection during the skid. You'll often wall-stick if you skid into the side of the building. If you need time more than tip money, and the path is clear, you can skid into the KFC sign in front of the entrance to stop instantly. (Of course, you'll want to turn your cab to the left during the skidding.)
  • When you know how to Limiter Cut, you'll find it's much better to avoid the streets behind KFC; the extra turns (and sometimes traffic) will slow you down too much. It's better to just take the corner near Customer 4 so you can maximize your Limiter Cuts by driving in straight lines as much as possible.
  • When you want to pick up Customer 5 or 6, it's quickest to go through the gap just to the left of the KFC building. (I always thought it was a drive-through window.)
  • Customer 5 to Heliport
    Since Customer 5 is always orange, there's no convenient way to tell if it wants to go forwards or backwards. For your very best chance of taking this customer to the Heliport rather than FILA, you actually have to start looking at customer patterns way back at the Levi's Store. Here's what to look for:
    • At the Levi's Store, both Customers 2 and 5 must be yellow. (For the absolute best chance, green Customer 6 should also be present.)
    • Drive forward into the Tower Records/KFC area. As you pass Tower Records, Customer 1 should be yellow, and Customer 2 should be light-green.
    • If the conditions listed above are met, take the KFC drive-through window shortcut and pick up Customer 5 for the best chances to the Heliport. (When all three critical customers appear at the Levi's Store, I'm guessing it's 80% or 90%; maybe 70% if green Customer 6 was absent.)
  • (for advanced and expert players)
    When you get really proficient at dropping off passengers with Speedy ratings and doing multiple laps around the course, you'll find that this is one of the first areas you'll "empty out." Tower Records and KFC are very popular destinations, but if you pick up a customer in this area for every passenger you drop off you'll eventually use up all of them. When this happens, you'll be forced to drive passengerless to the Church (or further) to pick up somebody.

    I like to handle this proactively. By driving passengerless to the Church earlier in the game, you should have both more time to locate a customer and a better selection to choose from. If you wait until later in the game when you've already chosen some of the Church customers, you may be forced to drive all the way up to the Heliport to find one that wants to go forward. Driving backwards to the Levi's Store can also be an option, but only as long as you're certain you'll find a forward-destinationed customer there. If you drive backwards and don't find one, your situation becomes even worse...