CVG review of Crackdown.

[brawndolicious]

8.7

But Crackdown is different. It's the first free-roamer that's really got inside our heads. We can't nip round town anymore without imagining the million ways that we could scale that Starbucks Cafι. It's reinvigorated our love for climbing trees. It's made us believe there ain't no mountain high enough, as long as we keep practicing our leaps. Crackdown, believe it or not, makes GTA's world (and, by proxy, our world) look stunted, boring and limited. Let's put it this way. In 1997, Real Time Worlds' Dave Jones invented GTA. In 2007, he re-invented it.
That's quite some claim, so we should probably quantify it. Crackdown isn't as good as Vice City or San Andreas - in fact, far from it. But it's probably the first GTA clone that isn't a GTA clone, if you get what we mean - all the wannabes we've played since we first leapt out of that burning police convoy in Liberty City all those years ago - from True Crime to Saints Row to Just Cause - this is the first one that doesn't feel like it's a 'me too' tribute to Rockstar's finest. It's got its own unique structure, its own unique progression tree and its own unique style. It's not a GTA clone at all, in fact - it's one of the first to treat the free-form urban city as a genre rather than something to be aped. What follows is something of such vision and ambition that it's no surprise that the final product is a bit of a patchwork of very good and slightly bad.

And the conclusion:

What cuts it short of true greatness is that it's almost a bit TOO experimental - perhaps it would have benefited from a more traditional storyline structure, because as good as Crackdown is, you do find yourself yearning for some direction at times. But like Tony Hawk and friends, just existing in Crackdown's world is enough. A wonderful sandbox title that branches off from the GTA tree rather than feeding off it; when you set off a huge chain reaction of barrels, you'll see the game Saints Row wished it was. When you climb to the top of the Agency HQ and peer down at the world, you'll see the game Just Cause could never be. And every so often, you'll see another moment of brilliance; a reminder of the game you want GTA IV to be.

Story won't bother me and I'm actually more hyped for this.

[MrAngryFace]

I have it pre-ordered. I made a point not to dl the demo.

[brawndolicious]

I have it pre-ordered. I made a point not to dl the demo.

It didn't really ruin anything but you'll like it.

SO ORGASMIC.

First thing you should do is look for agility orbs (green orbs that are on top of buildings) so that traveling by foot (which is funner) is possible.

[muckhole]

I think the only thing I disliked about the demo was the accelerated leveling up of the skills. Don't get me wrong, they made the demo great, but I'm gonna hate how much longer it's gonna take to get the highest levels in jumping etc. after being able to max them out in minutes in the demo.

[Phoenix Dark]

Why the fuck are they complaining about the story? You're a supercop. You have superpowers. You're set loose in a city to catch super criminals by any means.

That's all I need

[Mondain]

Why the fuck are they complaining about the story? You're a supercop. You have superpowers. You're set loose in a city to catch super criminals by any means.

That's all I need

that it might make the game lack direction, confusing and boring the player faster than it could've been

[brawndolicious]

It's not possible to have a good story set up around the premise.

I think the only thing I disliked about the demo was the accelerated leveling up of the skills. Don't get me wrong, they made the demo great, but I'm gonna hate how much longer it's gonna take to get the highest levels in jumping etc. after being able to max them out in minutes in the demo.

Well consider that the first two stars are 10X faster then the other ones and the third would be normal pace (fourth too I guess if you got that far) and the game will fuck your little nuts off!