Motor City Patrol

Motor City Patrol is a top-down driving game released in 1992 for the Nintendo Entertainment System.

It was developed by Source Research & Development Ltd. and published by Matchbox International Ltd.. The Motorcity game was designed by Eddie Gill, principal designer and founder of Source R & D. The graphics were developed by Chris Gill, with programming by Ian Richards. This was the first game developed by Source for the NES. The game style was consider by many to be the forerunner of Cop'n'Robber's games and spawned a new generation of car games like GTA.

Gameplay
The game itself is much like an early form of Grand Theft Auto. You drive around all day looking for speeders, robbers, and public enemies, while avoiding hurting innocent civilians. When a criminal (speeder, robber, or public enemy) appears on the precinct map, the player must either pull over or shoot the offender's vehicle. The game ends when you fail in a mission, receive 5 or more warnings, shoot a civilian, or total your car. After going through all five precincts (at seven days apiece), you begin in precinct 1, on day 1, with all your points, merits, warnings, and car upgrades. The game cycles indefinitely until the player loses.

Source: Wikipedia, "Motor City Patrol", available under the CC-BY-SA License.