What are the hell am I supposed to be doing apart from killing dozens of bad guys?
It’s the experimentation that entices us to want to play the full game as well as the levelling up process; basically so we can get to see the carnage we could cause with a full array of special powers or equipment that will be at our fingertips. Combat is dull and targeting is flawed if you’re planning to play the game with a standard machine gun in your hands, but by mixing it up it becomes a whole different ball game. Picking up a car and throwing it at an enemy or jumping off a building and shooting someone in mid-air are just two of the things that we tried and loved.
The city is vibrant and feels alive with dozens of pedestrians on the streets as well as cars travelling along the routes. The demo gives you the opportunity to razz around the city in an agency car and throughout Crackdown you can steal and drive a wide variety of cars (although you won’t be able to commit drive-bys). Cars are driven in third-person mode and, based on the demo, it’s entertaining to plough through a group of pedestrians or crash into other vehicles or buildings. The mechanics of driving are fairly smooth without ever being spectacular; it feels similar to driving cars in the likes of other free-roaming games, such as Just Cause or the GTA series.
Click for larger imageIn co-op mode, using cars was far more fun. We’d jump in a vehicle together and one of us would be ready to pick the other up if he got in a spot of bother; co-op mode looks set to be double the fun and double the chaos
The demo provides you with a decent amount of gameplay. In fact, until you reach level two in firearms skills you’ll be able to explore the world to your hearts content and even after that you’ll have a full 30 minutes left of the game. The cel-shaded visuals of the characters and the vehicles contrast well with the GTA style backdrops of multi-story buildings and street furniture and the game runs flawlessly with no frame-rate issues.
Click for larger imageIf you do play the Crackdown and wonder, like we did, ‘What the hell am I supposed to be doing apart from killing dozens of bad guys?’ then learn to experiment and the whole game opens up and your creativity blooms. We’re still reserving judgement as to whether Crackdown will be the type of game that has a long lasting appeal, but for the time being it’s an action packed bundle of fun that we’ve been playing over and over again. Kaboom!
