Silicon Fusion >> Reviews >> True Crime: Streets Of LA

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Review:

2nd December 2003:
True Crime: Streets Of LA
Does it blow its competitors out of the way, or just get a night in the cells? Find out inside..
Posted by Peter Cavan - PlayStation 2,GameCube,Xbox -

True Crime : Streets Of LA takes elements from many different games, and manages to produce an enjoyable title at the end. The obvious influences are GTA:VC, The Getaway and the Driver series, but there are certainly others. There is a large amount of slow-mo, from either Max Payne of Enter The Matrix. The addins are a bit like Dead To Rights or Headhunter. Oh yeah, and there's a bit of stealth as well, attribute that to whoever you want.
What you must understand is that these influences are by no means a bad thing, it just means that there isn't much in this game which will really make you sit up and think, "Wow, I've never seen that before." Sure, a lot of stuff is improved on and evolved to the next level, but then, some of it ain't.

Bickering over, this IS a solid, fun game. In the story you play as Nick Kang, a lone cop trying to find out what happened to his dad, who was LA's best policeman until he mysteriously disappeared. You get moved to the sophisticated EOD division of the LAPD, and have to do some investigating while still fighting crime. Cue hours of driving, shooting and fighting, and quite a bit of extra storyline woven through. Nearly all of what happens in the first hour or so concerns Nick's relationship with his new partner, who just sees him as a loose cannon. The entire story is told through cut scenes, which are both preceded and followed by loading bars. These are 'only' about 7 secs, but depending on how you play you can see them rather more often than most people would like. I do wonder why it needs so much loading time, it shouldn't take very long to load a cut scene, and do you really need to reload the city every time, even if you've just stepped through a doorway and back? The upside to this is that the huge city has no loading times within it, no GTA style postcard loaders halfway across a bridge.

Just so you know, the city really is HUGE; it takes ages to drive across the whole thing. You could say it loses much of the character and identity of a smaller but more diverse world, but bigger certainly has advantages. The freeways (motorways) are long, and are a good way of learning the scale of LA. This makes for a lot of exploring, and you are encouraged to look in every nook and cranny by 30 bones that unlock "Snoop Dogg" mode. Think VC's Hidden Packages as bones, and you've got the idea. The mode itself involves you controlling Snoop Dogg, who has his own car and phrases. This will interest some people, but certainly not all.

The graphics in this game are above-average, but nothing to blow you away. Everything is quite slick and well put together, and the facial expressions are paticularly good. Draw distance is about what you would need, but there are a couple of detection-type glitches (getting stuck in walls, that sort of thing). The sound acting is also good, but the music is all rap. I quite like rap myself, but it would be nice to at least have some degree of variety.

I said earlier that you will spend just about the whole game driving, shooting and fighting, and this is certainly the case. The shooting is nice, with polished touches such as flicking a dead opponent's weapon into your hand, but nothing too original. You do get a bit of slow-mo diving, but this has all been done before. There is a precision targeting mode which slows down time for about 5 secs and allows for a good aim, but as you can't move and aim in this way, it is of limited usefulness. Your own guns are just double pistols that will change in power, but not type. Therefore, you will never get SMGs, MGs, etc on a permanent basis. I have also never come across any non-bullet weapons (grenade, rockets), so have to assume that there are none available. The fighting seems great when compared to VC, but you quickly find that it is just button bashing follow by a simple combo. Repeat, and you will probably win. Not ass-kicking fun, more like get the job done plodding.
But don't despair, the driving is actually good. There is a good range of cars on offer, (sorry, no motorbikes, helicopters, planes, boats etc) but as none of hem have in-game names, you don't really get to like or hate any of them. This blands the experience, the cars don't seem to have much personality, just some are faster and some are stronger. Once in a car, however, you will enjoy yourself. Handling is quick and responsive, and once earned fancy moves like two-wheels or a 180 front switchblade are easy to pull off. You will enjoy just driving around town, and you can even shoot out of your car. After a few upgrades you can target wheels to safely stop a car, or a point on the trunk (boot) to make the vehicle blow up immediately.

Why wouldn't I always just blow the thing up, I hear you ask. Well, because you are supposed to be a cop, you have something called Karma. This goes up when you do good stuff like arresting people and finding drugs, and goes down when you do bad things like blowing up criminals or driving over pedestrians. All that karma really affects is the ending and your mission path, so you don't get much of a penalty for mindlessly killing hundreds of innocent people. Not really "to serve and protect," is it? It is far easier to shoot someone than fight them and cuff them, so many will go for being a bad cop. You lose some of the point of being a cop this way, but it does get the job done. This is one area where True Crime takes on VC, but fails. Vice City manages to make mindless killing really fun, but in TC you get neither this sense of achievement, or the satisfaction of being an officer of the law.

While you are driving from mission to mission, there are 3 main things you can do. The first is answering Street Crimes, which are random events that will gain you points to be used elsewhere. They seem really cool at the start, but soon get repetitive. I mean, how many times does the same lady get kidnapped or the same cannibal (Hungry Hector) break out of a police escort? The second thing you can do is go and get upgraded. These fall into the categories of fight moves, driving moves, or gun skills. These require 100 points, gained from doing Street Crimes, and you will get the upgrade if you complete a relevant test. Size of gun, precision, nitro boosts, and advanced grappling techniques can all be acquired. The third thing you might do in the city is frisk people. Walk up to them, press O, and you run a hand down one side of them. If they are carrying illegal weapons or drugs, they get arrested, and you get points and good Karma. If they are innocent, they get off with just one of a couple of possible retorts from our friend Nick Kang.

Overall, True Crime : Streets Of LA is a short, fun game. It melds together elements from multiple games and genres into one reasonably successful title. It has some flaws, but the good certainly outweighs the bad. If you already have something like Vice City or The Getaway this will probably be best for a rent, but otherwise this is for you.

Peter Cavan

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Review Summary:

True Crime is a driving/shooting/fighting game. It's great for a while, but won't take longer than a day or two. A blast while it lasts, but there are better games of a similar type out there.

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True Crime: Streets of L.A.
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