Atari’s DRIV3R Goes Gold; Reflections Interactive Completes Development
on Highly Anticipated Sequel to 12 Million-Selling ‘Driver’ Franchise Game.
DRIV3R Will Be Available For Xbox and PlayStation®2 In North America On
June 21 and In Europe and Australia on June 22

Atari, Inc. and Reflections Interactive are pleased to announce that development
is complete on DRIV3R, the highly anticipated driving action game for the Xboxâ„¢
video game system from Microsoft and the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment
system. DRIV3R will be available in North America on June 21 and in Europe and
Australia on June 22.

“The Wheelman is back…and in a big way,” said Wim Stocks, Executive
Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Atari. “Everything that was great
about the previous two games – the awesome driving, deep storyline, film-like
cinematics and the feeling of ultimate cool – has been amped to the next level
in DRIV3R. With amazing new technology, Reflections has blown away every other
game in the genre in terms of driving physics, graphics, and vehicle destruction
to create the ultimate movie-like action game.”

The next evolution of Driver, one of the most successful franchises in video
game history, DRIV3R is an action-packed driving adventure game that recreates
the excitement of a Hollywood blockbuster car chase and plays like an interactive
movie. Developed by Reflections Interactive (an Atari studio), the masterminds
behind Driver and Driver 2 – which have sold more than 12 million copies worldwide
– DRIV3R stays true to its roots, incorporating the cinematic gameplay and gritty
street crime of its predecessors with ground breaking graphics and three mammoth,
wide-open city environments.

Featuring Hollywood-level production values and a gripping, narrative story
line, DRIV3R casts players once again as Tanner, a jaw breaking, no-holds-barred
undercover cop who does whatever it takes to bring the bad guys down. In DRIV3R,
Tanner, alongside his longtime partner, Tobias Jones, must infiltrate a global
car theft ring in tire squealing chases and fierce on-foot firefights while
tailing gangsters, chasing witnesses, stealing cars and unloading massive clips
of ammo to bring the criminals to justice.

DRIV3R features include:

  • Blockbuster voice-over and scriptwriting talent involved from the ground
    up in the creation, production and performance of DRIV3R, including Michael
    Madsen as Tanner, Mickey Rourke as the sinister Jericho, Michelle Rodriguez
    as the sexy Calita, and Ving Rhames as Tanner’s partner, Tobias Jones
  • Three gigantic and true-to-life cities, including Miami, Nice and Istanbul,
    with more than 35,000 buildings hand-placed and decorated for intricate detail
    and ultimate immersion
  • More than 150 miles of major highways and city streets to explore plus
    countless uncharted open areas, alleys, dirt roads and smaller byways
  • A stunning graphics engine creating massive photorealistic environments
    – both indoor and outdoor – filled with hundreds of destructible objects to
    be smashed and blasted both in vehicles and on foot
  • Complete destruction models allowing vehicles to crumble realistically
    as they are bashed, smashed and driven to the limits of their design
  • Unmatched driving and physics engine creating the most realistic vehicle
    performance in any game and the most exciting chases ever seen
  • A deep, narrative storyline that plays like an interactive movie, recreating
    the attitude, action and car chase sequences of modern gangster films like
    Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch and Pulp Fiction; nearly an hour
    of CGI video fleshing out the plot with dramatic scenes of sinister crime
    syndicate dealings
  • Multiple solutions to missions allowing players to plan strategically before
    they move in on the crooks and choose between a full frontal assault or a
    more surreptitious alternative, depending on gameplay tastes
  • Driver’s signature “Film Director” function, which records every
    move made in the game, allowing gamers to place cameras anywhere, edit and
    direct a sequence and save their own Hollywood car chase to memory card to
    share with friends; on Xbox, players can upload their films to Xbox for other
    fans to download and view
  • More than 70 controllable vehicles, including motorcycles, boats, police
    cars, vans, mopeds, muscle cars and fully articulated 18 wheelers

DRIV3R is rated M for Mature by the ESRB and is expected to release in North
America on June 21 and in Europe and Australia on June 22. For more information
on DRIV3R, please visit the game’s official Web site at http://www.DRIV3R.com.

About Atari
New York-based Atari, Inc. (Nasdaq:ATAR) develops interactive games for all
platforms and is one of the largest third-party publishers of interactive entertainment
software in the U.S. The Company’s 1,000+ titles include hard-core, genre-defining
games such as Driverâ„¢, Enter the Matrixâ„¢, Neverwinter Nightsâ„¢, Stuntmanâ„¢,
Test Drive®, Unreal® Tournament 2003, and Unreal® Championship; and mass-market
and children’s games such as Backyard Sportsâ„¢, Nickelodeon’s Blue’s Cluesâ„¢
and Dora the Explorer™, Civilization®, Dragon Ball Z® and RollerCoaster
Tycoon®. Atari, Inc. is a majority-owned subsidiary of France-based Infogrames
Entertainment SA (Euronext 5257), the largest interactive games publisher in
Europe. For more information, visit http://www.atari.com.

Filed under: Games

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