A “make your own mind up” review of Crackdown for the 360.

The game

Crackdown doesn’t fit into a particular genre very easily but combines the free-roaming world of grand theft auto, elements from most 3rd-person shooters and some free-running/urban-running thrown in.

It is set in the future but only just. The buildings and technology are pretty much contemporary and the only hint that it is in the future is that your character is a clone and graphically it has the look of a graphical novel.

Your character is a law enforcement agent sent in to clean up the entire game world which is in the grip of 3 major gang factions. The idea is that from time to time, you discover hideouts for the various lieutenants of each gang while you roam around the map. Once they are all defeated, you have to take down the kingpin before that gang is vanquished.

One of the cool aspects of the game is that you have certain abilities – driving, hand-to-hand/strength, firearms and athletics. As you use each of these abilities you improve gradually as the game progresses. For instance, as you shoot more people, you get better at firearms and are able to kill quicker and target better. You start off as a killing machine and then progress to becoming a super-heroic killing machine.

Athletics can play a big part as you start by being able to jump up to ledges and drop down from a normal height. However, as you progress, you get to the point where you can jump pretty incredible distances. It’s quite satisfying climbing up to the top of a building and jumping your way across the city, and it’s a key part of the game because while you are up there, you can pick up athletics experience that improves you even further.

There’s a lot of freedom in the game in that you can roam around refusing to engage any gang members if you wish, even leaving the kingpins of the gangs until later, until you have leveled up your character. As you are a clone, dying is not a problem, in fact it’s almost an integral part of the game. You re-spawn at a supply point of your choosing and these supply points become available to you by you simply finding them on the map and using them for the first time. Once done, you can move between supply points you have used in-game and also change weapons or re-supply at the same time. If you pick up any gang members weapons, you can go a supply point and that weapon is then available forever in your arsenal.

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