Watch Dogs

 PC
User Score
6.4

Mixed or average reviews- based on 5182 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2,662 out of 5182
  2. Mixed: 913 out of 5182
  3. Negative: 1,607 out of 5182
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  1. fiendling
    May 27, 2014
    0
    Uplay is down, I can't download the game. Judging by the slew of similar problems reported here I can see that I'm not the only one.

    Maybe it is a blessing in disguise, the game seems to be a lame duck of a console port judging be the sites that I trust like Rock Paper Shotgun.
  2. thegamewarrior
    May 28, 2014
    3
    Decided to rent the game on Xbox One to give it a try. Aside from the loading screen issues and driving which makes the game annoying and nearly unplayable, there isn't much to talk about. There is nothing to say positive or negative about the game. It is just bland. The hacking isn't interesting, the characters are boring, and the plot is too basic. Multiplayer is a repetitive bore withDecided to rent the game on Xbox One to give it a try. Aside from the loading screen issues and driving which makes the game annoying and nearly unplayable, there isn't much to talk about. There is nothing to say positive or negative about the game. It is just bland. The hacking isn't interesting, the characters are boring, and the plot is too basic. Multiplayer is a repetitive bore with missions that seemingly have no value.… Expand
  3. carlbme
    May 30, 2014
    2
    TERRIBLE

    The story isn't bad. That's the ONLY reason I gave it as high of a score as I did.
    Boring city, terrible driving, terrible graphics, NPC's are on par with GTA3, terrible code causing terrible graphics to slow down a machine that can handle much better. The supposed freedom that comes with these style of games is severely lacking.
  4. arkyabbott
    May 28, 2014
    0
    Absolute **** how Ubisoft completely reduced all visual graphics and effects to cater to the underpowered console market. F*ck their marketing and completely capitalist money hungering f*ckery.
  5. wazzuppi
    May 28, 2014
    1
    This game is beyond horrible.

    Im playing this one PC, one thing i noticed straight off the bat, horrible horrible sleeping dogs driving and movement. ITS NOT AN ARCADE THIS IS MEANT TO BE NEXT GEN, or atleast playable!! I dont want an arcade driving, arcade button mashing, arcade shooting.. The old, accelerating vehicles to 100kmh in 2 seconds is rampant in this game, poor mechanics    This game is beyond horrible.

    Im playing this one PC, one thing i noticed straight off the bat, horrible horrible sleeping dogs driving and movement. ITS NOT AN ARCADE THIS IS MEANT TO BE NEXT GEN, or atleast playable!! I dont want an arcade driving, arcade button mashing, arcade shooting..

    The old, accelerating vehicles to 100kmh in 2 seconds is rampant in this game, poor mechanics all round, the vehicles are huge wide steering yet drive like trains.

    The texture pop ins - which are on purpose just annoy you. You cant even experience the world slowly without having crap ramped into your face ( i hated max payne for this ). You want to hide in a car after running someone over? NOPE useless. we will put annoying yellow circles in 3 seconds you have our hard to lose cops on your tail for 10 minutes which mind you, catch up to you regardless of how fast you go. The only way to lose cops is to GO TO HIGHWAYS!! YES HIGHWAYS, you cant lose cops the ordinary way ( the hacks dont work ) this engine does not recognise distance, only speed.

    It would have been so much better if it was slower paced - less crap crammed into your face, and MORE SIMPLER. Games have a reputation for coming out clunky, overly complicated and boring.

    Rent mabye, but i honestly would not waste my money.    … Expand
  6. boompow
    May 29, 2014
    4
    Such a disappointment. I was really expecting a level of interaction with the whole hack your surroundings that allows for different forms of game play but what we have is a magic button to simply hack everything. The problem is that with the "hacking mode" turned on you get spammed and just run around pressing Q in rapid-fire and when its off the hacking element disappears almostSuch a disappointment. I was really expecting a level of interaction with the whole hack your surroundings that allows for different forms of game play but what we have is a magic button to simply hack everything. The problem is that with the "hacking mode" turned on you get spammed and just run around pressing Q in rapid-fire and when its off the hacking element disappears almost completely. What is left is GTA 4 with worse driving and physics and lackluster repetitive quests. I really had high hopes for this and regret going pre-order. Bargain bin stuff… Expand
  7. TheAlmightyKid
    May 27, 2014
    0
    The game is exactly not what was shown at E3. From stupid driving to disgusting "next-gen" graphics the game is simply terrible. It also doesn't help that it tries to hard to be and beat GTA V which was a 10/10. Therefore I give Watch Dogs a solid and generous 0/10.
  8. vaguba
    Jun 21, 2014
    0
    This game really gives up around halfway through. The missions make absolutely no sense at all and the gameplay, although fresh and interesting, really gets stale when they repeat the same mission types over and over again just with increasing difficulty. The graphics are decent but performance suffers on PC.
  9. GridironCJ
    Jun 12, 2014
    2
    Quick rundown:

    - Horribly optimized for PC
    - Even at max settings, it's rather underwhelming for a PC release
    - Generic sandbox gameplay that doesn't go beyond what GTA V did
    - Poor story
    - Poor AI
    - Poor physics
    - Did not live up to the hype and not worth the way

    You're better off waiting until GTA V is released on PC, which has finally been announced.
  10. EV3RLiGHT
    Jun 8, 2014
    1
    What a truly pathetic first IP entry from Ubisoft.

    Let's list the problems: 1. The most graphically downgraded AAA yet. 2. 70+ Million dollar budget and at least 4 years of development (including a 7 month delay!) 3. Lackluster story, cliché scenes and "meh" voice acting. 4. Terrible and incredibly boring protagonist, I could not connect with him at all. 5. Stupid logic in    What a truly pathetic first IP entry from Ubisoft.

    Let's list the problems:
    1. The most graphically downgraded AAA yet.
    2. 70+ Million dollar budget and at least 4 years of development (including a 7 month delay!)
    3. Lackluster story, cliché scenes and "meh" voice acting.
    4. Terrible and incredibly boring protagonist, I could not connect with him at all.
    5. Stupid logic in missions, i.e. you are a "mass murdering vigilante". How f*cked up is that?
    6. Terrible optimisation on PC, runs like ass and plays like it too.
    7. Speaking of gameplay; no melee combat, terrible physics engine, I've seen better driving / handling in "Crazy Taxi" and "Ridge Racer".
    8. Ubisoft seemed to spend 90% on the marketing machine to hype up this poor excuse of a game, and 10% on actual development.
    9. Tonnes of bugs, errors and stupid bullsh*t that is game-breaking.
    10. Escaping from the cops is as easy as 1, 2, 3. Just hop into a f*cking boat!
    11. Stupid, senseless combat.
    12. You can smell the sequels as soon as you spend 6 hours installing with UPLAY!
    13. Uplay!
    14. Uplay!
    15. The missions are so repetitive, it just makes a grown man cry.
    16. Udon'tplay.

    Good stuff:
    1. Some-what original idea.
    2. Spider-tank trip.
    ... that's about it.

    TL;DR - Don't buy this garbage! Torrent it if you need to. If you want to "experience the next gen" play GTA V because GTA V is much more next-gen then this lazy piece of work. Shame on you Ubisoft. Can't wait for you to f*ck up The Division.    … Expand
  11. kalina
    Jun 5, 2014
    3
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. This game is disappointing. It has the potential to be much larger than the sum of its parts but the overall execution of the game is clunky and uninspired, it feels like each individual component of the game is unpolished and the optimisation of the game on this platform (PC) is woeful at this time.

    The story is pretty weak, the ending is a quick time event, the driving feels like you're driving through treacle, the shooting and moving feels like Aiden wants to hump the environment all of the time and the hacking is simplistic with no real depth.

    Overall the game has very little replay value although there is plenty of things to do during your first play through - side missions consisting of the same routine over and over again, gang hideouts consisting of the same thing over and over again, in fact... no, there's not really that much unique content to go through, just lots of the same thing over and over again.

    This game wishes it was Grand Theft Auto when it grows up, GTA with quick time events for hacking. Unfortunately, it will never be Grand Theft Auto when it grows up, because by the time it gets there Grand Theft Auto will have moved on to its next big thing.    … Expand
  12. MrBla
    Jun 13, 2014
    1
    It uses uplay, that's all you need to know. Uplay is no good, annoying software. Even if you buy a steam version you are forced to use uplay. do not buy it until ubisoft drop the uplay.
  13. hedning86
    Jun 8, 2014
    1
    I'm not sure what I would rate this if I could play it properly. It is a bit boring and derivative, and I really don't like the the car handling (but that could be my preferences), but otherwise there might be potential in the game. I say might because I've had to restart the game twice due to corrupted save files, so since the game was released broken I have to give it the score a brokenI'm not sure what I would rate this if I could play it properly. It is a bit boring and derivative, and I really don't like the the car handling (but that could be my preferences), but otherwise there might be potential in the game. I say might because I've had to restart the game twice due to corrupted save files, so since the game was released broken I have to give it the score a broken game deserves. When a fix is released for the save corruption bug I might change my mind, but until then this was a waste of money.… Expand
  14. Faloslord
    Jun 6, 2014
    0
    Nextgenshiiet like are old shiieet of olddogs. THIS like a douchebag in shieet . I could burn my money and get the same shhhiet. I can say some wolrd about this game :
    - This shiieit
    -This game suck my balls -Developers can suck my balls too , and go fucthisshiiietyourself. -I want kill peoples ather this NEXTGENNNNjaaaGAME. -IF U BUY THIS GAME UR MOM DIE from cancer of the rabies    Nextgenshiiet like are old shiieet of olddogs. THIS like a douchebag in shieet . I could burn my money and get the same shhhiet. I can say some wolrd about this game :
    - This shiieit
    -This game suck my balls
    -Developers can suck my balls too , and go fucthisshiiietyourself.
    -I want kill peoples ather this NEXTGENNNNjaaaGAME.
    -IF U BUY THIS GAME UR MOM DIE from cancer of the rabies uterus.
    -When i buy and play this game my dog is suicede. My cat try kill me . My dad try rape me. OMG WHYYY.
    -My turtle call in polece and say thet i mad and i plaistered thiiisshiiietnextgensheeeeit    … Expand
  15. DeliciousPubiQQ
    Jun 9, 2014
    0
    This game is so bad it keeps crashing also you get that bug that the game loads to 90 % and then stoppes working because of corrupting data ? what's this spending 70 € and then you can't even play it?
  16. phillipseiffert
    Jun 9, 2014
    2
    It is the 5th of June 2012. Ubisoft holds a press conference on E3 2012 and announces the game Watch_Dogs by showing a glimpse which stuns gaming enthusiasts with its graphics and features.
    //
    It is the 26th of June 2014. Ubisoft is not able to prevent people from playing before release. As a consequence of that Ubisoft servers are constantly down, what slows down the ability to play the    It is the 5th of June 2012. Ubisoft holds a press conference on E3 2012 and announces the game Watch_Dogs by showing a glimpse which stuns gaming enthusiasts with its graphics and features.
    //
    It is the 26th of June 2014. Ubisoft is not able to prevent people from playing before release. As a consequence of that Ubisoft servers are constantly down, what slows down the ability to play the game on release day. A lot of gamers have problems with uPlay, Ubisoft's own client. All in all: Release day was a mess. On my side, however, I was able to download it one day before release day, but were not capable of playing because the game crashed when being on main menu. One day later, it worked with redownloading it.
    I was able to play Watch_Dogs two days long until a loading screen bug hit me on 28th May. I enjoyed playing Watch_Dogs since it was fun to explore the whole world, main and side missions. Indeed, the game has been dramatically changed since E3 2012. These two years changed everything so that you can see E3 2012's glimpse as a betrayal regarding the gameplay we actually got. Of course changes have to be made during development, but these were so radical.
    The reason why I give Watch_Dogs two points is simply that I wait for an official announcement of a patch for two weeks now. This is unacceptable when considering that so many people are affected. Ubisoft missed to care about their customers, Ubisoft missed to patch the game early, Ubisoft missed to get rid of a Beta bug. There is no excuse for this mess.
    Watch_Dogs release is even worse than DICE+EA's Battlefield 4. And that, ladies and gentlemean, says a lot.

    -ps    … Expand
  17. pandamax2
    Jun 9, 2014
    1
    Remember E3 2012? Then you might as well remember the first ever watch_dogs gameplay, it was so stunning and we all were so excited. But in the end it when it comes out it was nothing but an overrated, badly coded console port.
    Not to mention the tons of things that need to be fixed through a patch like
    #glitches
    #bugs
    #poor performance in high end systems
    #random crashing and freezing.
  18. Susken
    Jun 15, 2014
    3
    Don't play it, don't buy it. The game is just bad, its repetitive you will have the same gun fights over and over again. It does not matter if you play stealthy or go in guns blazing. Its the same thing. Just get into the red zone and kill anything on sight there are no consequence's, well ok maybe the cops will come but that is it. And you can do this all the time in any mission justDon't play it, don't buy it. The game is just bad, its repetitive you will have the same gun fights over and over again. It does not matter if you play stealthy or go in guns blazing. Its the same thing. Just get into the red zone and kill anything on sight there are no consequence's, well ok maybe the cops will come but that is it. And you can do this all the time in any mission just repeating the pattern all the time. There is not much to do, well yes the city is huge but the misions are all the same. And the graphic is realy nice i must say but i dont think there is much diference in Low settings and on Ultra plus it does realy not matter because the frame drop is the same. It happens all the time and is anoying as hell. The story is boring as hell. The ending sucked. I was realy looking forward to this but it was only hype.… Expand
  19. A_Darker_Prince
    Jun 15, 2014
    2
    I'm going to be slightly generous in this review. This game can definitely be fun. Hacking people's phones (even if it's one-button pressing) is a unique spin, as is hacking traffic lights, road spikes, road blockers and all that. I also really enjoyed some of the stealthy missions, I enjoy stealth games.
    But that's about as far as the good stuff goes. Here comes the bad. Now, I had to    I'm going to be slightly generous in this review. This game can definitely be fun. Hacking people's phones (even if it's one-button pressing) is a unique spin, as is hacking traffic lights, road spikes, road blockers and all that. I also really enjoyed some of the stealthy missions, I enjoy stealth games.
    But that's about as far as the good stuff goes. Here comes the bad. Now, I had to install this game onto a USB, so that may be the reason for some of these problems, but still, I had to install this game three times, with 45 minutes per installation. You could understand my immense anger in doing that, it shouldn't have had to happen. Also, the game locks up on me. A lot. I've had it lock up on me eight times, each time being on a bridge. And now I'm on a mission where I have to take down an idiot in a firetruck. Who goes onto a bridge. It locks up on me every time, giving me an Error screen...
    But, those are the glaring technical issues. Other issues are as follows:
    - WHY can't I shoot from my vehicle, and WHY can others shoot me from theirs!?
    - The Enforcers...I hate them, they soak up WAY too much ammo to drop, but they can kill you in a matter of seconds?!
    - Skill tree. Another cliche in gaming.
    - Revenge. Another cliche in gaming.
    - While Aiden is bearable, he's kind of an ****

    If the technical issues didn't occur, or if they don't occur when the game is installed onto an XBox 360 Hard Drive, I'd immediately give this game a 7 out of 10, but as it stands, this game is unplayable.    … Expand
  20. V1rTus
    Jun 16, 2014
    2
    The game came out quite crude and uninteresting. Ubisoft is nothing new except the towers can not think. In each game, stupid tower. How much can you? In Far Cry 4 again will probably tower. Stupid and miserable NPC control. In general, the game - dog ****
  21. Ziemowit
    Jun 21, 2014
    0
    Funny requirements looks like the game! The game is not a forum for the PC as it should!
    Ubisoft overstated requirements game barely runs on a very powerful computers
  22. Atik16209
    Jun 24, 2014
    1
    Physics are VERY bad, definitely not next-gen or 2014. Gameplay and storyline are bad as well. Graphics are not even close to what was shown. The old GTA IV without any mods can easily compete with this game
  23. Fritteee
    Jun 24, 2014
    0
    The only good thing in this game is the story, all the other things is really bad. Please be prepared to be frustrated, angry, cursing all the time at this game if you want give up 30h of your life when you can do something much better, for example, looking into to the wall for 30h, which is a much better way to waste your time. I don't recommend this game so don't play it!
  24. M_Alamri
    Jun 25, 2014
    0
    I've given this game a low score because it's the worse optimized AAA title in recent past. To make things worse, the patch released by ubisoft made stuttering worse on SLI rigs. And just overall the game screams of poor optimization, I mean why does it need more than 2gb vram for textures that look like they were taken from the N64? I'm never buying a Ubisoft game on launch again and II've given this game a low score because it's the worse optimized AAA title in recent past. To make things worse, the patch released by ubisoft made stuttering worse on SLI rigs. And just overall the game screams of poor optimization, I mean why does it need more than 2gb vram for textures that look like they were taken from the N64? I'm never buying a Ubisoft game on launch again and I hope others do the same. We shouldn't let this one slide.… Expand
  25. gnad1992
    Jun 27, 2014
    1
    Complete garbage. Even if you're playing with Ultra settings, you won't like this game. Physics are horrible, driving is painful and gunfights/hacking is no fun at all. Avoid at all cost. If you're planning to buy this game, think again, and wait for GTA V PC / next gen edition.
  26. rebornyama
    May 28, 2014
    2
    I can't believe I bought the hype.

    - Nvidia Gameworks. Yeah, let's be competitive with AMD by screwing them customers. - Horribly unoptimized for pc. Frame dropping everywhere. You'd thought that having Nvidia Gameworks would make this game great for NVIDIA's GPU? Well you're wrong. Apparently even two titans won't be able to get stable fps on 1080p. - Driving mechanics : WTF were    I can't believe I bought the hype.

    - Nvidia Gameworks. Yeah, let's be competitive with AMD by screwing them customers.
    - Horribly unoptimized for pc. Frame dropping everywhere. You'd thought that having Nvidia Gameworks would make this game great for NVIDIA's GPU? Well you're wrong. Apparently even two titans won't be able to get stable fps on 1080p.
    - Driving mechanics : WTF were they thinking.
    - Uplay : Still sucks. Paying customers are locked out of their games on the 27th while pirates are free to do what they want.

    10/10 won't recommend this game to my friends. Unless you can get this cheap; cheaper than the other dog games that is Sleeping Dogs.    … Expand
  27. Monstrum
    May 28, 2014
    2
    This game is absolutely garbage! Its not on the graphic levels they sold everyone on at E3. The game play is boring and simple. The main character you play is boring and uninspiring. I think this shows how much the mighty have fallen in game culture. I can't believe "Game Journalists" are giving this game anything over a 6.0 or 2 stars depending on their rating system. I've already tradedThis game is absolutely garbage! Its not on the graphic levels they sold everyone on at E3. The game play is boring and simple. The main character you play is boring and uninspiring. I think this shows how much the mighty have fallen in game culture. I can't believe "Game Journalists" are giving this game anything over a 6.0 or 2 stars depending on their rating system. I've already traded this game in for the new version of Tomb Raider. Can't wait for the Witcher 3!… Expand
  28. Hurricane
    May 28, 2014
    2
    Ubisoft lied to us all the time. So much hype about this game, and what we've got?
    -Bad Graphics
    -Lags and freezes
    -Car physics from saints row
    2 points for hack idea and Chicago
  29. Douglas
    Jun 19, 2014
    0
    Ubisoft is the new EA. Screwing players because they don't care. They found lines on the files saying: This is PC only, who cares.... Plus they artificially made the PC port with worst graphics and slower just to improve PS4 and Xbox One.
    Luckily a modder called The Worse found a way around this. PC offer much better graphics and better performance without any lag, removing Ubisoft ****    Ubisoft is the new EA. Screwing players because they don't care. They found lines on the files saying: This is PC only, who cares.... Plus they artificially made the PC port with worst graphics and slower just to improve PS4 and Xbox One.
    Luckily a modder called The Worse found a way around this. PC offer much better graphics and better performance without any lag, removing Ubisoft **** programming.
    This is unacceptable. If you don't like PC don't screw the players, simple don't launch a PC version and go burn in hell!    … Expand
  30. Kaidan
    Jun 5, 2014
    0
    8 Crashes in one hour.

    Really disappointed with Ubisoft on this one. I was excited to hear when they were pushing back the release date because it would mean a more polished game at launch right? Ubisoft made this game for Nvidia rigs only. If you have ANY AMD components, you'll likely suffer the same fate as me, crashes gallore (this isn't AMD's fault - more on this later). I have a    8 Crashes in one hour.

    Really disappointed with Ubisoft on this one. I was excited to hear when they were pushing back the release date because it would mean a more polished game at launch right?

    Ubisoft made this game for Nvidia rigs only. If you have ANY AMD components, you'll likely suffer the same fate as me, crashes gallore (this isn't AMD's fault - more on this later). I have a Nvidia GTX 770 but an AMD FX 8350 processor. I thought I would be fine with a Nvidia card.

    I thought wrong. After doing some googling it turns out that Ubisoft gave AMD the back of its hand and worked exclusively with Nvidia in the creation of this game. Essentially, Nivida was allowed to place as much input as it wanted into the development of Watchdogs, but AMD wasn't allowed to even say hello. The result?

    Terrible performance (and crashes) with AMD rigs until AMD scrambles to put up a driver patch just because Ubisoft played favorites. Don't count on Ubisoft riding in to fix the problem for AMD users- Nvidia paid them off to make sure nothing like that's gonna happen. Don't get me wrong, this isn't a bash on Nvidia, I've been a long time fan of their cards, but Ubisoft needs to work openly with both manufacturers and not play favorites or the whole pc gaming community will end up suffering as a result.

    Jason Evanelho from Forbes wrote a great article on this madness entitled "Why Watch Dogs is Bad News for AMD Users-- and Potentially the Entire PC Gaming Ecosystem" - well worth the read    … Expand
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Awards & Rankings

2
#2 Most Discussed PC Game of 2014
20
#20 Most Shared PC Game of 2014

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
77

Generally favorable reviews - based on 18 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 10 out of 18
  2. Mixed: 8 out of 18
  3. Negative: 0 out of 18
  1. Pelit (Finland)
    Sep 3, 2014
    79
    Ubisoft's flagship title has a really, really repulsive protagonist. The entire storyline feels like it was cranked out of a automated story generator. On the positive side, Watch Dogs looks really good on PC, especially after modding the graphics to match the visual splendor of the early E3 demos. [Aug 2014]
  2. PC PowerPlay
    Jun 29, 2014
    70
    There are some strong gameplay elements in Watch Dogs, but overall it's merely an adequate open world game. [July 2014, p.46]
  3. GameCritics
    Jun 23, 2014
    80
    Nothing could have realistically lived up to the immense level of hype that Ubisoft stirred up for this game, and while I value strong narratives and envelope-pushing technological advancements, I place just as much importance in the ability to enjoy the gameplay that's being offered to me. Watch Dogs is one of the more exciting sandbox games of the last few years, and if this is to become Ubisoft's next big franchise, I'm excited to see where they take it.
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