Going by the ridiculously low amount of impressions anywhere on the Internet, I'm starting to think nobody bought it.

Every thread about the game seem to just be people endlessly bitching about Ubisoft and Mircotransactions.

Missing a "Didn't fall for that one, Ubisoft!" option.

Was interested before playing the beta. With all the Ubisoft craziness going on right now, I'll wait and pick this up for $10 in a few months.

Don't regret it at all, having lots of fun with it, building a car and unleashing it into the world with myself or against other people has been a blast. Don't have any problems with handling at all I have although had connection problems here and there. But I was expecting that, I have yet to see an online focused game like this launch without issues.

I dunno but people have seemed to write this game off because of a few people dissing the beta, I didn't play the beta myself or really check out footage apart from the unfinished on the site. Then it seems more people have written it off due to the whole review thing, don't understand why people are up in arms about that, it makes sense to me that an online game gets reviewed when its properly populated. But that's a whole other story, the game is fun, and to make it better I've played around 15 hours and only filled out 10% of the map.

I really hope that's the case. Publisher who hide their game from press under the guise of "our shared world experience isn't populated yet" should be severely punished. The only time that isn't true is if all the reviewers and critics who review / preview games for a living aren't enough people to properly enjoy your game. That certainly wasn't true for Destiny, and I doubt it's true for The Crew either.

I do not regret not buying it.

It seems to be catching a lot of negative comments about things that frankly aren't even problematic.

The microstransactions aren't problematic. The servers for the most part are fine (definitely acceptable by todays standards).

I think the comparison to other racing games is a little odd too. It's a gear-based game. My level 200 Mini feels way better than my level 10 Mini. My level 200 Camaro feels significantly better than my level 10 Camaro did. Either people don't understand that and think its appropriate to compare to racing games that aren't gear based progression games or people are just making bad comparisons for the sake of it being a Ubisoft game (despite being generally pretty good)

Voted Ubisoft. While I am interested in the concept of The Crew I would be playing it on PC if I played it at all. Buying an Ubisoft game for PC anywhere near launch is an extremely risky proposition. I'll see how it shakes out for a few weeks before deciding.

Probably my favorite broken poll so far with 2 votes spread across 3 options for a total of 150%!

@villainy: I understand being cautious for the PC version. I have it and it runs smooth with all settings maxed (besides maybe only using MSAA). Frames don't drop and I have had zero connection problems. I'm actually pretty baffled at how smoothly it has played for me so far. I have played it for about 7-8 hours as of now.

@villainy said:

Voted Ubisoft. While I am interested in the concept of The Crew I would be playing it on PC if I played it at all. Buying an Ubisoft game for PC anywhere near launch is an extremely risky proposition. I'll see how it shakes out for a few weeks before deciding.

Probably my favorite broken poll so far with 2 votes spread across 3 options for a total of 150%!

Well those are the exact results I got after I voted just now, so that means it must be true, right?

Also, I voted Ubisoft, because I wasn't fooled this time.

Not at all since I didn't buy The Crew nor have any interest in the game... unless the car can actually climb towers, then you have my attention you silly Frenchmen.

Its an ubisoft game, of course it's gonna catch shit regardless of it even being the second coming of Burnout 3: Takedown (far and away the best Burnout).

No, I am enjoying it. I think it is a pretty good game.

The Beta was hot garbage and I usually love even mediocre open world racers (see also: TDU2). I'll pick it up once it's like $10 to tool around the legitimately impressive USA map. The handling is dreadful. The story is corny. The graphics look dated. The online never worked for me even once out of the several times I played the Beta.

Unless they miraculously fixed everything in the last 2 weeks, The Crew is not a good game when we're living on the same planet where the Forza Horizon games exist. Even TDU at least had competent driving wrapped around it's corny story, I'd probably buy this sooner if they handling on every car in the beta wasn't so poor.

Edit: I should add that I was REALLY looking forward to this game and cancelled my preorder based on the beta. I did not enjoy it at all. I actually preordered this along side my PS4 over a year ago, then ended up getting NFS:Rivals instead, which is another bad open world driving game.

Where's the option for "People bought this?..."

A lot of people who haven't bought it and never played it don't like it cus of the publisher. That makes sense. Ivory Tower must love that.

How hard is it to make a poll that actually covers all the potential responses?

I'm waiting on the inevitable Quick Look where Jeff will continue hating it and whoever is with him either confirms dislike or makes non-committal, indifferent comments with the conversation eventually going off into a tangent of how they wish X developer made Y driving game again.

I don't think there was anyone more excited for this game on this site then I was. Since it was first unveiled at E3, I saw the potential for greatness. It was one of my favorite games at E3 in both 2013 and 2014 and it was also my most anticipated game of 2014. And then I played the beta.

The graphics look like poop. It is a small complaint, but when the game has no redeeming qualities then that sucks. The eagle in front of the knock-off MGM in Vegas looks like something a child made with Play-Doh. The game sounds like poop. Seriously, the sound of drifting or burning rubber is nails on a chalkboard. The engines themselves also sound really bad. I literally cannot think of a recent game that sounded this shitty. The physics are poop.Here is a video of me going down a mountain and trying to hit a rock/ramp to go flying. Here is a video of me getting sucked into the railing on the freeway and then spit back out. You can also hear a bit of the nails-on-chalkboard tire screeching I mentioned in that clip. The handling is poop. At the end of the day, gameplay is king. If the game were fun to play all the other complaints would be forgivable. However, the cars all handle like ass. With the default settings it is laughably terrible, but even after tweaking it the handling never feels good. Cars feel both floaty and too heavy at the same time and the car's ass seems to have a mind of its own.

All that said, the huge map was great and the customization was solid. I will probably pick it up when (not if) it hits $10 sometime next year.

You should not have to unlock good gameplay. You know what Forza Horizon, Gran Turismo 5, Mario Kart 8, Midnight Club: Los Angeles, and Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit have in common? They are all fun to play. Comparing The Crew to pretty much any game with a car released in the last 10 years inevitably makes The Crew look bad. Seriously, Twisted Metal had better handling and better races than The Crew, and the racing missions in Twisted Metal were terrible. Even open world games like Sleeping Dogs and Saints Row have better handling then The Crew.

Yes I bought it and yes I regret it. I regret it more than any game I've bought at all recently, including games I haven't played yet (of which there are many).

The bad....

Every car or truck has the same handling quirks, they all feel like the trunk is full of water or something, every time I steer left or right going at any sort of speed, two things happen.

1. The car takes too long to actually respond to your command, leading me to think something was off on my tv calibration (it wasn't).

2. Once the car does respond to the turn, it has a vicious moment where apparently traction kicks in and overcorrects the steering... I think this is oversteer? i don't know, but it routinely leads to me spinning out or extra-extra cautiously taking corners, after which I do the thing where the car overcorrects and leads me to weaving back and forth across the road for a good few seconds.

There is also a lot of bullshit with the AI. If you have the game, as an example, try the XFINITY race in western Wisconsin thats unlocked from the start, and watch how the AI drives... they all stay in a pack, all driving literally the exact same way because of rubberbanding (including allowing you to catch up). By "in a pack" I mean all 7 of the cars will frequently be within 30 feet of each other, for all of the race.

What else... cops drive through other AI cars, (literally phase through them). Thats weird.

The graphics look more like a real, real good PS2 game than a PS4 game. Any / all of the burnout games have done collisions better.

The story, but who cares, its a driving game. But yea, its baaaaad.

Checkpoint races that you have to restart from the beginning if you lose - fuck checkpoint races.

Random non-racer AI cars stopping in the middle of the road during races. That was my first experience with this game, two AI civilian cars stopped in the middle of the first intersection of the first race of the game. Like, their AI just got shot off as soon as the race started.

The good...

The environment is really ambitious!

Some of the coop stuff seems ok, the two times i've seen people actually near me. It makes the rubberbanding AI less obnoxious because now if either of you win, you can progress.

The sound *staging* is really good. By that I mean I agree with the above poster who said the cars don't sound good themselves (I don't think they sound awful), but their positioning in my 5.1 system allowed me to defensively drive and sort of keep them from passing me without having to use a rearview, which is all I can ask for.

Huh.

In summary: Jeff will probably not like it.

Honestly this is the first racing game I've enjoyed since NFS Underground 2. It starts off slow, but the world really opens up to a large variety of activities, and 14 hours in I've yet to explore 85% of the map. It's also relatively difficult, which is always welcome for me. Too bad the soundtrack is so lackluster, lots of generic nobodies on the radio.

@north6: Oversteer is caused by the rear wheels losing traction, making the back end of the car swing outwards. From this I take it that the physics are trying to be not purely arcade-y, but not enough to satisfy either crowd.

The Crue. You're going to drive the band around the country in their tour bus, the better you drive the more you make eventually upgrading the tour bus, and challenging other 80s bands.

This is my free game at best buy today. Should i return it? Get something else instead?

(I am getting Farcry 4 and DA otherwise)

@laserguy: That game tied in to Rock Band Crue?

@ottoman673: It's one of the worst racing games I've played. The game is somewhat arcadey, but the phyisics and driving model are just NOT FUN, no clue why it doens't have the Drive San Francisco physics model, or one based on any previous Ubisoft game, as it sucks. There are tons of upgrade parts, but they are TOO incremental, as it's nearly impossible to tell the difference, I mean.. maybe if you get far in with a car and then swap it back to lv 1 parts you may feel a difference but while playing it I can't tell anything.

The game loves "chase" missions where are just really tedious as generally you won't be able to touch the car you are chasing until the last 30 seconds as the AI will rubberband it far ahead of you as you slowlllllllyyyy close the distance over the course of 3 minutes.

There is a "reset to road" button that is nearly essential as the physics tend to decide that most accidents should spin your car around 180 degrees, there are tons of times when for seemingly no reason my car is getting very minor airtime and thus can't turn. In fact.. turning is terrible, it's horrible, like the game just has horrible turning even after changing the settings from the default it's still shitty.

Really, it's just worst.

But I rented it from Gamefly so NO REGRETS.

Nope... because I didn't buy it! HAH, Ubisoft! Didn't see that one coming?!

@laserguy said:

The end-game consists of getting The Crue back to the Sunset Strip where Vince Neil and Axel Rose get into a fist fight outside the Whiskey (but mainly just pull each other's hair).

OK, joking aside - I find it absolutely astonishing that there has yet to be a single review for The Crew posted by what I'd consider a reputable online-based game review site. http://www.metacritic.com/game/playstation-4/the-crew/critic-reviews

I mean, holy shit - the game has been out and being sold to people in stores since Tuesday the 2nd. Even AC Unity had reviews out late on release day. I thought outlets would surely have the bulk of a review worked out (based on the game itself and the mechanics) and just have to wait to see how the online architecture holds up to real-time loads before adjusting/posting the reviews - now I have no idea what the hell is happening.

Review copies from Ubisoft didn't arrive until at least launch day (per Jeff on this week's Bombcast).

I know that, and my comment addresses that.

My concern is that reviewers already basically knew how the game felt/played from playing it up to launch, Jeff himself had a full impression of how the game felt and how the mechanics worked. Ubisoft delayed sending review code until the servers were up so reviews would be based on the game populated with real-world players and under real-world server conditions. I do not understand how we are nearing a week later, there ARE some reviews posted from some smaller and/or print outlets, and there have been no reviews from any of the "big" online outlets. People having to look to forums like GB looking for people's opinion on the game because there are no reviews out there is just really weird (though not necessarily a terrible thing).

The NPC cars and police in this game seem to be held to an entirely different set of physics than the players do. The first escape mission I did really demonstrated this for me, as did the first takedown mission. The handling, speed and expertise the AI gets access to is just ridiculous. I totally get that a V12 police interceptor is probably going to be faster than my entry level Nissan. That I can deal with. What I can't stand is that they seem to be able to take turns at crazy fast speeds with none of the physics involved in doing such a thing. The AI seems like it is on rails at all times while my car feels like it is on snow.

The police cars seem to have engine and brakes that use some kind of inertia dampening system. More than once I've tried to use oncoming traffic to get them to crash or slow down and it never works. If they do slow down it is with a level of precision and control that isn't possible in any vehicle I've driven (in this game or any other for that matter). I haven't ever taken the time to look at what happens but they're driving something other than a car. They can then match and exceed my speed in a way that just shouldn't be possible.

It genuinely feels like they took shortcuts with the AI so the game is challenging but didn't properly balance it. I had to restart that first escape mission like three times because I was absolutely owned by the cops over and over.

I dont doubt he won't like it, it's a multiplayer only focused racing game where you have to team up with other people in order to get shit done. Jeff and coop-multiplayer is a huge no, even if he wanted to try to do coop he would have to find someone to team up with, and no one in the office likes racing games besides drew but drew hasn't played that many.

@sharkman: That is a very logical way of looking at it and much more scientific than my own. I was basing my assumption on the fact that each time I've heard Jeff mention The Crew in any capacity it was always in an overwhelmingly, even hyperbolic, negative way. Having played the beta I can't say it was the greatest driving game I've ever played but it certainly wasn't a complete piece of shit.

Hot "The Crew" update on buyer's remorse.

I have still yet to ever actually succeed in getting into a "pvp" multiplayer race. Last night I drove around and did missions for 85 minutes (the pvp timer keeps track). I almost got all 4 of the players once, I was very excited, then I got a message stating "The Crew servers are unavailable or you have lost your internet connection" and was kicked back to the splash screen, and was unable to actually play again. This was after about 30 minutes of trying and failing to beat a performance spec car with my dirt car, and marvelling at the "retry" screen which promises "Retry last part?" when what it really delivers is "Retry at beginning of race?" because they probably were too time-crunched to put in race checkpoints.

In short, FUUUUUUUUUUCK this hot pile of trash game. Level 23, I'll probably keep playing because I fucking hate it so much and apparantly hate myself too.

It isn't a multiplayer focused game, the multiplayer doesn't work.

So they've already halved the price of the game here in the UK at retail (£25 from £50) I take it that means the launch didn't go well? I've held off since I've read plenty of reports of empty online sessions and it being damn near impossible to actually form a crew at this point.

I don't regret buying it at all. Between this and Forza Horizon 2, I am set for arcade racing for a while.

yeah, realized this after i saw the quicklook. most of the hype leading up to the games release stated that it was a mmo-racing rpg. I guess no one really knew what it was until after release; glad jeff and dan gave it a fair shake though, after hearing the disdain from jeff every-time it was mentioned before the quicklook.

I would have bought The Crew. But I had just started Horizon 2. Horizon 2 is like really good. I didn't like the way the cars in The Crew handled in beta. I'm told they get better after you level up a bunch, but I shouldn't have to drive a car that drives like shit for hours before it gets good.

Anyone still playing The Crew? Just was curious if it had any lasting play value. I've been looking to pick up a new game, since I haven't had much to play lately. I gave NFS Rivals a shot, but just could not get into it. The structure seemed really disjointed, and this is coming from somebody who loves Hot Pursuit and Most Wanted.

Apologies in advance if someone thinks I'm trying to restart an old thread.