Gamer's Diary - Crackdown

When I sat down to play last night, I wanted something different, some game I hadn't played in a while. I picked games at random from my play book until I found one that sparked my interest. I chose Crackdown.

I remembered enjoying it when I'd last played it over a year since, and that it didn't require a large investment in time or mental effort. So I thought it should offer the kind of after-work brain-switched-off half hour of fun I had looked for. I suppose then that irony best describes what happened next, for I spent four hours playing it.

I had forgotten just how much fun this game has in it.

Shooting criminals with a fully automatic assault rifle from insane distances, picking up cars and throwing them at bad guys, running them over with the Agency super car, leaping up the sides of tall buildings in a few bounds, jumping off said building and sniping a thug while in midair, making a Hulk-like dent in the pavement on landing, making a chain reaction of explosions including the cars the crooks hide behind, launching gang vehicles into the sky by driving under them with the supercar - I find very little not to like.

Finally, I really like the art direction. The game producers have done everything up in a semi-cel-shaded comic-book style that integrates well with the game's central premise of a superhero cop who partakes equally of Dirty Harry, Mr. Incredible, and Demolition Man.