Driver: Parallel Lines

Driver: Parallel Lines takes place in an entirely open world environment, in which mini-games are now accessed from the in-game world instead of from a menu, while the game also features some new elements that are common with Grand Theft Auto – visible blood when someone is shot, an "Auto-aim" feature (with manual aim also available), a money system, fully modifiable vehicles (with a test track to test out upgraded vehicles), and environment destruction (i.e., lamp posts can now be run over and fire hydrants can break, spewing water into the air).

A new felony system is incorporated in Parallel Lines, which can differentiate between personal felony and felony "attached" to vehicles the player has used. If the player attracts police attention on foot or in a certain vehicle, the player can suspend their wanted level by losing the police and entering a "clean" car, though it can be reactivated if they spend too much time in the sight of a police officer, who will eventually recognize the player as "wanted". The same principle applies to out-of-car activities such as weapon use, in which players can holster their weapon in order to lose police attention until spotted committing illegal acts again. For the Wii version, the felony bar is replaced with a "stars" system, similar to that of Grand Theft Auto, which light up when the player attracts police attention. Like Grand Theft Auto, the game features fictional, yet distinct styles of vehicles based upon real automobiles that were in use within New York between the two periods.

In 1978, The Kid or "TK" (David Walsh) works as a getaway driver for criminals in New York City. As TK returns to Hunts Point to rest at the garage owned and run by his friend Ray Davies (Brian Bloom), Ray decides to help him move up in the criminal world by introducing him to Slink (Geoff Brown), the owner of a local strip club. Slink becomes impressed with TK's skills and eventually introduces him to two close associates – Bishop (Rodney Saulsberry) and "The Mexican" (Nolan North). The men assign TK to help assist them in the breakout of Candy (Michael Cornacchia), a criminal mastermind, from Rikers Island.

After Candy's escape, the group introduce TK to their boss Corrigan (Ian Gregory), a corrupt undercover police officer, who reveals that he intends to take over the cocaine business from the city's Colombian cartel. Candy devises a plan to capture a prominent Colombian drug lord, Rafael Martinez, and ransom him back to the cartel. TK successfully kidnaps Martinez and recovers the ransom money for Corrigan but upon handing it over, Corrigan and the others kill Martinez and betray TK, implicating him for the murder. While the gang leave to take over the cocaine trade, TK is imprisoned in Sing Sing prison for 28 years, and spends his time planning to go after the group upon his release.

Driver: Parallel Lines revealed in August 2005, with a stated release for March 2006. Video game media reported that Reflections had "listened" to fans following the "failure" of Driver 3, by making numerous changes and spending more time driving during missions rather than on foot. The game was originally intended to include online multiplayer, but this was scrapped when it became apparent to the developers that they could not deliver a strong multiplayer mode and wanted to focus entirely on the single-player portion of the game.

It was initially released for PlayStation 2 and Xbox in 2006 in North America on 14 March, European territories starting on 17 March, and Australia on 23 March 2006. The PlayStation 2 version was released in Japan by publisher AQ Interactive's distribution subsidiary Extreme Line on 12 October 2006. Ports for Windows and the Wii were released simultaneously the following year in North America on 26 June, Australia on 28 June, and in the United Kingdom on 29 June, with Ubisoft's Barcelona studio handling the Wii port.

The game received "mixed or average reviews" on all platforms according to video game review aggregator Metacritic. Praise went towards the story, fixes and improvements over the previous title, but criticism went to the implementation of some elements in the new formula and the unbalanced difficulty.

IGN gave the PS2 and Xbox versions 7.2 out of 10, praising the return of the series to its roots, and mentioned that "it's still not perfect, but it's not broken either". GameSpot gave the same versions 6.5 out of 10 and called it a competent GTA clone, but far from being recommendable. Eurogamer gave the PS2 version 6 out of 10, while stating that "there's not too much shame in trying to do what GTA does, of course (and at least it's not about bloody gang warfare for once), but while this is definitely a solid improvement on its dreadful predecessor, it needed to achieve a basic level of competence and build upon it, and it only does that to a very limited extent". 1UP.com gave it a C+ and wrote: "Sure, it's derivative as hell, but there's nothing getting in the way of actually enjoying the game now".