Gameloft sneaks Driver: San Francisco onto the Android Market

Back in 2008, Gameloft mainly plied its trade by porting its extensive Java library over to the App Store, rather than developing games specifically for the platform.

They weren’t incredible titles (unless you have a seizure when someone mentions brain training), but they looked slicker than most releases at the time.

Now, in 2011, Gameloft is trying the same trick on the Android Market.

Driver: San Francisco, which appeared on the Market over the weekend with nary a peep from the publisher, appears to be a direct port of the J2ME version of the game (of which a review will be up on site soon) - warts and all.

So there’s open-world(ish) driving, five different neighbourhoods to tear down, and really basic cut-scenes of the two main characters chatting in cars. There are also apparently 30 different ‘dares’ to track down in Free Ride mode, with the first presumably related to buying the game in the first place.

While we’ve no doubt the game is pretty slick for a Java title, we’re not too sure what Android owners - accustomed to titles like Asphalt 6 and Reckless Racing - are going to make of this one.

It's also worth noting that Gameloft hasn't seen fit to release the game on iPhone.

If you like living on the edge, you can grab the game for £1.99 from the Android Market now [download].