This is my first review ever, so be nice with me, and oh, I played this game on the PS3. And English isn't my mother tongue, so I'm sorry if some things don't make sence. I've played the game a good 10 hours or so, but i forget pretty fast, so I'm sorry if I can't come up with something.

The good:
-Good graphics, the cars look good, and LA looks wonderfull
-Free roaming game, you can go wherever you like, and do what races u want
-Tuning your car was never so fun, you can choose between so many things
-BIKES ^^

The bad:
-The game is really hard and frustrating at times

Story: Well, there isn't really a story in this game, (or not that i know of, i couldn't really hear what they were saying in the game because i had to mute my sound ), but it's about some bloke who likes to drive. He has to prove himself by doing races, delivering packages and cars, and destroying other cars.

Gameplay: This is where the game shines. It's all about racing, but there are different kinds of races. You have the normal races, (or thats what I call them, you'll encounter them the most). This is normally a race against opponents numbering from 1-4. You have to do a sprint, (one lap), or a cirquit (more laps), following yellow smoke trails, these serve as checkpoints, so missing one is pretty bad. You'll have to do these races when racing for other cars, doing time trials, and other. Then you have the traffic light races, these can be started by flashing your lights at other cars (ofcourse they have to be racers, a normal car won't do anything). These start at the nearest trafficlight, and they don't follow a route, so you can choose the route you want, (preferably the fastest ). That's it I think, there's alot more but i can't remember. You have to do these races by cars, or later by bikes. Ofcourse you can't pick the Lamborghini at first, you have the option to choose between 3 cars, all crappy, and you'll have to tune them from nothing to blitzzz... (ofcourse you can buy other cars later, but they'll do quite nicely). And there are the bikes. There are only 3 of them in the game, but they are far superior to cars, however, cars have their pluspoints aswell so i think i'll compare them.

Cars: plus
-Stabel
-very good speed
-good acceleretion
-good handling
-alot of tuning possibilitys

min
-alot more expensive then bikes
-will get stuck in traffic, where a bike can manouvre trough the cars
-not as fast as bikes
-they make slipstreams for ur oppnonents

Bikes: plus
-cheap
-very fast
-very good handling
-very good acceleration
-they make no slipstream

min
-almost no tuning possibilitys
-hitting a wall or car too fast will get you flying
-they require alot more attention

So... I think I've summed that up quite nicely, overall i like bikes more, but that's just my oppinion. But there's alot more about gameplay, so..
What's so important about the slipstream? Well, above your speedmeter youve a slipstream bar, and when that's fulled up you can do a nitro boost.
So it's quite important to stay behind your opponents to get the full potential of your boost. Opponents will use this too. When roaming around, looking for races in LA, you'll somethimes encounter cops. If you go to fast, or crash in other cars, you'll somethimes hear on your radio (somehow you have a radio on your car with the same frequention as the police uses) and they will send a patrol car to check the place out. This will be shown on your speedmeter, that the police is running around. Its best to avoid their cars. But when you do are found by the cops, you have two options, or you stop your car and pay the low bill, or you try to speed away, and avoid it. Now, it sounds fun, but the problem is that the cops in this game aren't as stupid as the one like in GTA4 for example.. They'll keep on chasing you, and the longer it takes, the more agressive they'll be. And the longer the chase takes, when they finally capture you, the higher your bill will be. By now I've only managed to outrun them once, and it nearly wrecked my car. That's right, your car will take damage when crashing against other cars, hurray . This isn't much of a problem if you keep it repaired, you can do this by going to a gasstation, or to the garage. Or at the end of a race, however, when you get the option to repair it at the end of a race, it will only repair your "inner car" but not your "outer car". You'll still have scars and destroyed paint all over your car. you can avoid this by going to... a gasstation or the garage. By now you think, get to the point allready ^^. Well, i'll sum up the most anoying part of the game, and that is its difficulty. Somethimes the game is sooo hard, and soo frustrating, that you'll litterlly start crying out of frustration. All the other cars ride like they're being driven by Michael Schumacher himself, they are like masters of the road. And I think they don't even notice when crashing against other cars, they keep on driving, the same speed as they had before, while when i ride against a fricking car, i come to a total stop, probably that my car's flipped over as well... The game has the anoying habit of, once flew of your bike, flipped your car, to "revive" you in the most anoying places of the road, and these are mostly behind the cars that you crashed against, so that you can't really enjoy a fast start. But how do u win races and money, you think? Well, you don't really need to finish first, even when you'r second or third, and when ur lucky fourth, you'll get money (less then when u'r first), and repuation. (you can get new tuning possibliltys with repuation), so that you don't have to panick if you can't finish first. And later in the game you get the option to choose one of the four cool special ups, ranching from slowing time, to using an EMP to stop all other cars ^^. So, i think i'm done with gameplay for now.

Graphics: The cars and the game look really good, the vinyl's are made very good, and the paint of the cars is outstanding. The city and the sattelite map of the city look really good too, its like you are driving in a real game. Rain is made well, and so are the sunrise and sunset. However, when you are going fast it happens somethimes that the graphics are fading, so that you'r like riding in a blob.

Sound: Lots of good music, from rap to heavy metal, to listen to, the cars and bikes sound really well, however, i don't really like the voices in the cutscenes, they sound a bit weird.

Multiplayer: Sadly enough i haven't got my multiplayer working yet, so I can't comment on this.

Lasting notes: Midnight club: Los Angeles is a very hard, but very rewarding game, it is very fun, and it will last for a good while. If you are looking for an arcadish race game, this is the game you'll want.

I give it a good 8.7/10