Crackdown 3

Crackdown 3 is a weird one to review, because it feels distinctly out of date. The delays and changes in direction have resulted in a modern game with design sensibilities that feel over a decade old, but they hold up incredibly well. While not a long campaign, the time I spent with Crackdown 3 was a lot of fun and it's an easy recommendation to fans of the original. Just make sure to play as Terry Crews to improve the experience.

Crackdown 3 comes directly from the past, from an era in which the open-world action games focused mainly on the number of things to do, to the detriment of the overall quality and variety of situations. This does not mean that the formula proposed by Sumo Digital doesn’t work: far from it. But it’s linked to a now anachronistic concept of a genre that has evolved over the last couple of years into something that goes beyond the simple repetition of the same tasks throughout the duration of the campaign.

Despite all the promises and the delays, Crackdown 3 is an unexpected miracle. It’s genuinely a fun game to pick up and play for a couple of days, but not for longer, as its dated design will turn this experience into a boring and monotonous adventure. Might not be worth the full price, but for members of Xbox Game Pass it’s an obligatory stop.

The bland, repetitive mission design and a boring story make Crackdown 3 a quite forgettable experience.

Sumo and Elbow Rocket’s insistence on treating a game from 2007 like a sacred text is strange. The original Crackdown was fresh and exhilarating, and bounding across the city as a superhuman agent was a thrilling sensation. Since then, a lot has happened in the genre. Developers have found ways to incorporate destruction into the action as they weave interesting choices and competent world-building into their narratives. Crackdown 3 aims far lower, and manages to hit that disappointing target.

Repetitive and middling, Crackdown 3 is a totally average open-world game that doesn't give itself a way to stand out.

Competent, with enough fun weapons and silly spectacle to make it inoffensive entertainment. While a half-decade of development hell could’ve ended with worse results, it’s tough to muster much excitement for what’s here.

We'd be lying if we pretended we didn't have some fun with it. But it only works in the same way a McDonald's occasionally hits the spot: this is cheap, junk-food gaming that comes with a side-order of regret. [Issue#331, p.110]

I think no one would have shed a tear if Microsoft quietly canceled this pointless game instead of seeing to completion.

Crackdown 3 offers the same experience as the original. Mainly collecting orbs and getting greater because of them is very entertaining. Too bad it's ten years too late: it's old-fashioned and boring, even when EVERYTHING is exploding around you.

A confusing end to a confusing era for Microsoft. We can hope, at least.

The single player campaign of Crackdown 3 and its multiplayer betray the troubled development of this game. The final result is patchy and not convincing.

The development of the third Crackdown got stuck somewhere and it is hard to tell if it’s because of complications with the cloud or just a bad vision. The result, however, is a very average game that entertains only undemanding players or fans of the series. [Issue#293]

This is a mediocre release, and whatever excuse we make for it – that it’s practically free, that we expected no better, or that it’s following one of the worst sequels of all time – doesn’t make it look any less out of date.

I don't think I'd call Crackdown 3 an awful game, but I would call it dated.