Repetitive, but fun and short enough that it does not overstay it's welcome, but definitely undercooked in some regards. Very much a "subscription service filler / discount bin" kind of game. It's not a game that can really be recommended, but if you play it with no expectations, you'll be entertained for a couple hours.
From what I understand, Crackdown 3 is a part of loved series,Repetitive, but fun and short enough that it does not overstay it's welcome, but definitely undercooked in some regards. Very much a "subscription service filler / discount bin" kind of game. It's not a game that can really be recommended, but if you play it with no expectations, you'll be entertained for a couple hours.
From what I understand, Crackdown 3 is a part of loved series, especially the first game, and it had heaps of expectations also built up by some PR hype that it did not live up to. I'm not a Crackdown fan, this is the first one I played, and I only know of the expectations and hype from tidbits that I picked up here and there. That being said, this game definitely feels like Early Access game entering the beta stage. It has the world, it has the technical side of content down - all the weapons, all the vehicles, and so on, it can be finished all the way through. However, it has not been polished for full release yet, it has balance issues, it runs like azz, it crashes randomly, some of the more complex stuff like animations isn't quite there, etc.
Except there was no polishing, the game was released in that state and not nearly patched enough afterwards. Money and time constraints? "F-ck it, we've been trying for years and we just can't get it done, just release it."? Who knows? I don't. The result is clear though, there's an interesting idea, and a core that actually works (mostly at least), but the game simply isn't finished.
The graphics are "your generic UE4 early access game" level. By virtue of the engine itself, it has some decent effects, most models look okay, but the terrain isn't anything special and gets really bad in certain places. In regards to design, it's mostly doing things right - the city looks interesting, has a bunch of distinct locations, etc. The vehicles, weapons, etc. are all well designed - and as mentioned, the models are pretty good for the most part. Not what you would expect from a high end game, though - not even close. I'm not a graphics purist by any means, but fam, if your game tries to put a foot in the AAA space and your terrain is most reminiscent of Serious Sam: The First Encounter and half of the textures are blurrier than 144p video further massacred by YT compression, you are doing something wrong.
Sounds are okay, the ambience is more or less nonexistent, soundtrack is good and the tracks are fitting the situation and location, although none of them really stuck with me. Voice acting is also good, for the most part.
Story and characters - anti-corporate "covert commie" cringe support cast vs. cartoonishly evil villains with retarded goals, and doubly-retarded methods. I understand that this was meant to be over the top, but this is really really bad, not to mention so predictable that skipping cutscenes has no impact what so ever. I'd be okay with throwaway story as a simple justification of "go shoot crap" or with a parody or a satire. However, this story and these obnoxious and stupid characters, endlessly and incessantly b-tching at you in and outside of cutscenes, are a videogame story equivalent of that guy on a forum losing an argument due to his stupidity and then going "Joke's on you! I was only pretending to be retarded!" No - that guy is retarded, and so it the writing in this game. I'd give this game an extra point if it had no "story moments" and "banter between characters" (I am loathe to call them such), and was just a sandbox where you cause mayhem and tear down a crappy corporation. I've worked in a few, so that option alone would be a good enough motivation.
Gameplay wise, the game is okay, this is definitely the strongest point in my opinion, but it's by no means perfect. I love the guns, they are great, albeit unbalanced and there's about 4-5 that are just flat out better than anything else. Combat overall is pretty fun, fast, a bit on the chaotic side, but manageable (aside from the last boss where it just turns into too much of a mess). There's a lot of verticality, especially in the second part of the game. The platforming is also pretty decent, but it's let down quite a bit by really janky camera and the "latch on" mechanics aren't exactly stellar. In regards to the vehicles - their physics and drive models are god awful, there's no good, fun to drive car in the whole game, and you're better off just running and jumping around. In regards to the structure of the game, it's basically just a bunch of side quests strung together with the "story" of this game with a couple boss - fights / main quests in the second half, albeit most of the main story quests are really just larger side quests, they use the same mechanics, etc.
Performance - pretty bad. The game microstutters all the time even on a very strong PC, and it crashes randomly.
In conclusion: If you haven't played Just Cause 2 and 3, or Red Faction: Guerilla, go play those instead. If you have and need mayhem fix, go replay them.… Expand
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