CrimeCraft

Crimecraft / Crimecraft: BLEEDOUT is not the best massively multiplayer online role playing game ever released (or currently available to be honest), but for a free to play game that is easily accessible (as in downloadable through Steam), you could do worse.

Gameplay: It is unlike most MMOs in terms of its gameplay and quest design. To compare it to something more known, Crimecraft’s quests are structured much like Call of Duty’s multiplayer matches and multiplayer challenges. The quests ask the player to compete in multiplayer matches where they can face off against other players or against NPCs. The game types include things such as capture the flag, zone control, Head hunter (where you kill a number of NPC controlled enemies), death match, and team death match. I should also mention that this is a third person game, it does not include a cover base system but in terms of controlling your character it still feels quite good.

The better you do in these matches, the more experience and money you get, which you use to level up, and to get abilities which are like the perks seen in Call of Duty. Extra grenades, fire/burning ammunition, invisibility, these can all be picked abilities and used within multiplayer matches. You use the money that you earn to repair your equipment and buy new cloths and guns.

There is one major thing that seems to be affecting the game play as of this writing. The servers (currently 2 for North America, and 2 for Europe) seems to have dangerously low server populations. I often find that there are only 4 – 8 games preparing to start or currently in progress. I played the game for 15 hours and only got to level 20, but the number of games seemed to remain low no matter what level I currently was.

Graphics: One of the really surprising things about the game was the graphics, or more correctly, the art design. Admittedly the games technical graphics are not that amazing. There is little bloom effects or realism here, and the characters move with stiff almost robotic animations. But something about the apocalyptic city impressed me. Something about the neon lights mixed with the dark blue of the city streets (it’s always nighttime in crimecraft’s city hubs, its daytime during the multiplayer matches) mixed really well together and made me appreciate my time outside of the multiplayer matches. There are also billboards/posters that contain nice game art as well. Maybe it is just the fact that most games are brown and gray now, but yes, I liked the visuals Crimecraft had to offer.

Story: It is similar to other post apocalypse fiction, you are the “new guy” in town and you have to start at the bottom of the barrel. Other than that however it’s like most MMOs, you get quests that amount to go here get this, go here and kill these people, things like that. I should also mention that there is no spoken dialogue for the quests, much in line with most MMOs.

Sound: Nothing to make note of here really. It’s not bad, or amazing, it just gets the job done. While out and about in the city hubs, there are city sounds as you would expect. In the multiplayer matches your ears will be filled with the sounds of explosives going off and constant gunfire as you and your team mates shoot it out with the opposing team.

Overall: I like the time I spent with Crimecraft: BLEEDOUT. I have bought games before which I played for an hour or two and thought, “Wow, I really wish I had not bought this”. So when I say I played this game for 15 hours without any guilt of having bought the game (I played it for free, just downloaded it) I can honestly say I enjoyed the time I spent with it. It is not an amazing game, and I don’t think I will go back to it since I have games like Call of Duty 4 on my computer which does pretty much the same thing without quests (just level up and play matches etc.). But if you were someone who does not have a lot of money to spend on videogames, and just wants a game to kill some time and have some fun, you could do worse than this game.