‘This game is a toybox’ says Jim Cope at Dundee developer Ruffian Games. Made up of half the team that created the original Xbox 360 hit, Crackdown 2 is perhaps in the safest possible hands, playing to the strengths of what made the first title so appealing and adding in a slew of insane new toys for your Agent to play with. As Jim says: ‘This game is childish, but it’s all shits and giggles’. Well said sir.
Set a few years after the Agent released a horde of mutant freaks on to the streets of Pacific City, a three-way civil war has torn the city apart and plunged it into chaos. The civilians, mutants and agency forces are locked in an ongoing power struggle to claim the city, with your Agent stuck right in the middle. Similar to the first title, there is a day-night cycle, but this time it doesn’t exist simply for aesthetic purposes.
When night falls, the mutants come out and roam the streets, killing the few remaining civilians in their sleep and generally causing trouble for everyone. The Agent can wade through the streets tackling hundreds of freaks at once using a meaty new assault rifle or by using the all new melee system. In the example shown, the Agent rips a steel girder out of the ground and uses it like a massive club, battering freaks to bits without breaking a sweat. According to Jim, the new melee system is quite similar to Fable II’s streamlined melee commands. Ranged weapons also let you auto-target parts of the body, as demonstrated by a brutal headshot.
Another superb feature that will make co-op even more fun is armoured cars. During the day, civilians do whatever they can to survive another night with the freaks by gathering supplied and adding armour plating to vehicles. The sight of an armour-plated freight truck with a minigun turret on the back was a tantalising prospect. Just imagine one player driving and another manning the gun. Magic!
During the night, Agents can activate ‘Freak Breach’ side-missons by springing perimeter traps set up by the mutants. Once the alarm has been raised, waves of enemies will home in on your position and the aim is to survive the onslaught. No hints were given as to what the reward for completion would be, but I reckon it could be EXP bonuses. Speaking of which, agility orbs make a return for achievement fans and EXP is awarded for performing certain actions. Melee kills give you melee EXP and so on.
Perhaps the best ‘new toy’ revealed were the all-new ‘mag grenades’ that wreak havoc with the games perfectly tuned physics engine. It’s a little tricky to explain but here goes…If you stick a mag grenade on a car, then throw another on a nearby wall, you can create an elastic band effect that is caused by the electrical charge running between the two grenades. The examples shown included creating a makeshift bridge between two buildings by tethering a line of cars together and levitating them across the gap and creating a slingshot between two buildings that was used to launch a car at a group of pedestrians.
If you have ever played Spider-Man 2, this was similar to the slingshot move that Spidey can use to gain momentum. Another neat trick is that you can shoot nozzles off gas canisters to turn them into makeshift missiles. By tethering one to the ground with a mag grenade you can create swirling perimeter traps as the canister spins round and round on fire. Rather awesome.
Also impressive is the inclusion of the riotous ‘Keys to the City’ mode that is unlocked from the start in Crackdown 2. This is a bit like Halo 3’s Forge mode and it lets you spawn a large set of items into the map. Jim showed this off in superb style by spawning about 40 cas canisters, 10 cars, about a million grenades and (oddly) golf balls into a giant chimney throwing some sticky charges sown the pipe then setting the whole cocktail off. First, the gas canisters came firing out of the funnel and exploded in mid-flight like a mental fireworks display, then the cars came spewing out, closely followed by a shower of golf balls.
The last scene is a perfect example of the ethos behind Crackdown 2. In true sandbox style, the potential is here to run riot around the city and engage in some absolutely insane horseplay, something has was lost in Rockstar North’s GTA IV. Multiplayer also seems a tantalising prospect, with 16-player PvP confirmed and a hint of a 16 player PvE mode that Jim couldn’t talk about today.
Crackdown 2 is due for release in 2010, The rulebook on fun will be re-written at release. Bring it on!
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