Crackdown 2 Preview

26 May 2010 at 12:54:48 by Staff Writers

When Crackdown was released back in 2007, Microsoft Game Studios decided to bundle it with an access code for the Halo 3 beta.  The move made some gamers suspicious - Crackdown was either going to be rubbish or simply another new IP struggling to find an audience all on its own.

But fast-forward three years and Crackdown is now considered the sleeper hit of ’07: a pre-GTA IV open-world shooter that set its sights on player-creativity. Creativity meaning, in this case, “pick-up and throw cars at your leisure,” because the game was built to be torn apart in as many inventive ways as you could imagine. You controlled a cybernetically-enhanced Agent, capable of casually jumping over buildings in a city crumbling under the weight of gang warfare. Your purpose was to take out the crime syndicates terrorising Pacific City while building up your abilities to comically super-human levels. This was a super-hero game without well-known super-heroes.

Speaking with Crackdown 2's producer James Cope, he tells us "The game has a lot in common with graphic novels. Both games have taken that on board stylistically, but it's also basically a super-hero game. It has that sense of humour. There's no way we could let you mow down zombies civilians without having that vein running through it.” Crackdown 2 is a good shade darker than its predecessor, while still managing to keep its tongue planted firmly in cheek. The first game may have given you super-human abilities to take out organised gangs, but now that strength is being tested and matched. Meet your friendly mutant compadres! Like the original, Crackdown 2's stylistic influences are rooted firmly in the graphic novel genre. The game is a cartoon apocalypse, taking its cues from B-movies as it opens with a series of fake network news bulletins and breaking reports. Mutants are roaming the streets. Do something about it. Do something about it with your friends, if you like, because Crackdown 2 allows up to four-person co-op.

Pacific City is now even more of a bullet-grazed mess, overrun by zombie overspill and populated by jerks with guns. Following the events of the first  game, portions of the city have fallen victim to the bio-weapon being developed by the Shai-Gen corporation.  Now with the sequel taking place a decade later, the fine denizens of Pacific City are split between these groups of infected, casually called “The Freaks,” as well as fringe gangs. These groups are divided between the night and day cycle, allowing for different forms of gameplay depending on the time of day. At night the mutants come shuffling through the streets like roving packs of drunk Brits on holiday - some of them have only rudimentary melee skills, others are more advanced. They’ve mutated far enough to become better, stronger, faster, and god they’re ugly bastards. Then, by day you’re being shot at by guerrilla gangs, largely because they’re guerrilla gangs and, you know, that's their thing. The city, understandably, is in ruins.

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