Crackdown

I grew up on sandbox games. As a kid, I enjoyed having an open-world map to explore and mess around with at free will. To this day I still hold a strong attachment to these sort of games, especially with the lack of GTA games in recent years.

So I decided to revisit Crackdown, an action-adventure game released in 2007 by Realtime Worlds as an exclusive to Microsoft's Xbox 360. Realtime Worlds was a development studio based in Scotland which was founded by the creators of notable game series such as Grand Theft Auto and Lemmings. Crackdown was one of the very first sandbox games I ever played as a kid, and still has a strong place in my heart all these years later. But is this game still as good as I remember it? Well, let's take a look at Realtime Worlds' debut title, Crackdown.

Crackdown Review (Xbox 360)

Synopsis

In terms of story, Crackdown focuses on the Agency - an international police organization which have been tasked with removing three criminal factions from Pacific City. The city's gang activity grew to a point where the police force wasn't enough to combat this influence, and the city urgently requires the assistance of the Agency.

Using the disgraced work of an ex-Agency scientist, superhuman soldiers known as Agents were created and designated to bring an end to Pacific City's three gangs: Los Muertos - a Latin American street gang; the Volk - and eastern European militia group; and the Shai-Gen Corporation - a private organization from east Asia. The game starts in the Keep, an Agency compound which houses the Agency Tower - the tallest and most recognizable landmark in the city.

Setting

Crackdown is an open-world game first and foremost, which means that the main star of the game is, without a doubt, the setting. This game takes place in Pacific City, a once utopian city state which has fallen under hard times with the rise of various gang syndicates throughout the city. There are several unique landmarks and areas in Pacific City which provide assistance in making the city layout more memorable.

Additionally, there are several districts in Pacific City - each with their own unique charm and architecture suited to the Agent's free-running skills. La Mugre is typically the first district you have access to in Crackdown, and is mostly made up of residential buildings and apartments. You will eventually end up in the Den, an industrial area which houses several factories and a power plant. And finally there is the Corridor, a commercial district which primarily offers high-rise apartments and office complexes. The buildings in each district are strategically designed so they can be scaled by Agents of particular skillsets which will be explained later on, typically the Corridor is reserved to Agents highly-skilled in Agility, whereas La Mugre is primarily for inexperienced Agents with no training in Agility.

Gameplay

Crackdown's gameplay is similar to Grand Theft Auto III and Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction, in the sense that you have full access to an open-world environment - you can run and drive freely around the game's map and shoot at enemies with a moderate amount of weapons to choose from.

You take the role of an Agent, whose main goal is to eliminate all 21 gang bosses scattered throughout the city, each gang has 6 generals and 1 kingpin. The game allows you to kill any gang boss in any order, but advises you to kill the generals first before taking the fight to the kingpin - as the kingpin will be much weaker without the defenses provided by the generals. When you arrive at a gang boss's stronghold, the Agency will provide you will additional intel on that target; sometimes including valuable information on strategic points of interest within the gang boss's stronghold. There are a limited number of gang bosses which require more initiative and tactical planning to track down and eliminate. Once you eliminate a gang boss, you will be rewarded with new intel regarding the aftermath of the gang boss's death - and Agency peacekeepers will arrive at the compound to maintain law and order.

If you go by the order in which the game initially recommends to you, the gangs will get progressively more difficult to combat - wielding more deadly weapons and having stronger units at their disposal. After you kill all generals and the kingpin of a gang, you will be notified of a last stand at a specific location where rioting gang members are to be found. Your Agent is required to kill all remaining gang members during a last stand to clear the city of a criminal syndicate.

One of the core gameplay mechanics featured prominently in Crackdown is the use of a skill progression system. Your Agent has 5 key skills featured on the left-hand side of the HUD: Agility, Driving, Explosives, Strength & Firearms. Each skill can be improved when it is used against gang members; for instance if you beat down a gang member, you can earn experience in Strength which adds up to a total score. Once you reach a score of 99, your Agent will have one of their skills increase - which provides the Agent with useful upgrades. Beyond using certain skills against enemies in combat, you can also collect orbs scattered throughout the map. There are a total of 500 Agility orbs and 300 hidden orbs in Crackdown, the Agility orbs increase your Agility skill whereas hidden orbs provide you will small experience in all skillsets. You can also participate in various checkpoint races across the city, road races are traditional vehicle-based courses whereas rooftop races require you to use parkour to reach the goal.

Each skill is extremely beneficial to upgrade and can make the Agent faster, stronger and more durable as the game progresses. As your skills improve, your Agent's physical appearance will change to suit their new upgrades. If the driving skill is increased, your standard Agency vehicles will have the ability to transform into stronger and more durable automobiles of destruction.

Outside of all of what was mentioned previously, the game is slightly skimpy on content for today's standards. After the Crackdown's launch, Realtime Worlds released 2 DLC packs for the game. The first DLC includes a "Keys to the City" mode, which gives players access to cheats that can be triggered and selected from a menu - this mode however disables achievements, leaderboards and saving / loading the game. This DLC also added a New Game + mode called "Resurrect Gangs" & also added the ability to impound select cars in the main game. The last DLC added a "Street Racing" mode, which is similar to road races in the main game but utilizes AI-controlled opponents to race against. Despite these DLC packs, Crackdown can still get surprisingly stale at times and the game is best played for at least a weekend.

Graphics

When it comes to graphics, Crackdown ditches the realistic look popular during that era for a more stylistic visual approach with heavy influence from comic book illustrations. The game's cel-shaded style is visually similar to games such as Prince of Persia (2008) and Borderlands, and works well in the game's favour in correlation with Crackdown's chaotic gameplay / sandbox nature.

While the overall visual style gives Crackdown its identity, there are few minor graphical hitches which show the game's age. For instance, textures can look low-res when viewed up close (presumably because Crackdown was made primarily for standard TVs). But beyond small nitpicks, this game has a unique, and fitting style to complement the addictive gameplay.

Audio

In terms of audio, Crackdown has a sizeable amount of licensed music which can be listened to via the main menu or while driving a vehicle. The music selection can change depending on which car you drive, but is primarily made up of electronic, techno, foreign, and instrumental tracks from artists such as Atlas Plug, Celldweller, Kinky and DJ Krush. While the variety of music in question is limited to a few genres, the music itself actually suits the tone of the game surprisingly well in my opinion. Many of these tracks I found myself listening to outside of the game. Even though I rarely found myself using vehicles, the music was a nice addition to the game's structure.

Regarding voice acting, there's only once prominent voice throughout the game - which is the Agency Director who guides the Agent and provides assistance from start to finish. The Agency Director is voiced by Michael McConnohie, best known for his roles in the Transformers TV show and Red Faction: Guerrilla. McConnohie provides a good, commanding voice which reminds you that you're not always fully in control of the experience. Unless you want to turn his voice off, then you can do so in the options menu! When it comes to NPC voice talent, I can't say I recognize any of the voices, but they do provide for some hilariously over-the-top acting.

Outside of the music and voice talent, Crackdown makes great use of audio elsewhere. Significantly with the use of the collectible Orbs in the game. When in range of an Orb, you will hear an identifiable noise which grows in amplitude if in proximity of the Orb. This can make collecting all the Orbs in the game slightly more bearable, as they emit noise to inform you of their presence. If you want to collect all the Orbs, that is.

Conclusion

In summary, Crackdown still stands the test of time as one of the greatest exclusives for the Xbox 360 generation. It was so influential that it ended up becoming an inspiration for the creation of series such as InFamous and Prototype, as well as giving inspiration to existing series such as Just Cause and Saints Row to experiment with new and interesting gameplay mechanics. That is why I give Crackdown a 4 / 5 for its simple yet effective gameplay, stylized graphics and good use of audio. This game would score higher if it offered some more post-game content.

It's no secret that this game was the king of all sandbox games back in its day. Unfortunately that all changed with the sequel, which I will talk about in another review...