True Crime: Streets of LA

"Great potential squandered horribly."

When walking through the virtual labyrinth of drug dealers and high-speed car chases that is this game's representation of downtown Los Angeles, one must constantly have their wits about them. A lesson I soon learned after my in-game character accidentally “bumped” into a random passerby and exited the encounter with his back pocket curiously lighter.

“Hey, stop! That guy stole my wallet!” cries the victim, but the numerous pedestrians make no response, either tragically deaf or painfully apathetic. Whatever the case, it seems like I'll have to take matters into my own hands.

I begin to chase down the perpetrator. My character is surprisingly fit, able to significantly gain on the pickpocket over two blocks. Apparently not to be so easily outdone, the pickpocket proceeds to dart into the road, yank open the door of a random car, throw out the occupant and speed off into the distance.

So I do the same.

Oh yeah, did I mention my character is a cop?

Though you wouldn't guess it at first, the main character of the game is indeed an upholder of the law; a member of the Elite Operations Division of Los Angeles, no less. His name is Nick Kang, and, in the words of the game, back from a lengthy suspension on the streets of LA to “set things straight.”

Unfortunately, setting things straight comes at the cost of innumerable street signs and kiosks, both of which are plowed through with no regrets by the fleeing thief and Nick alike. Occasionally the front end of Nick's car may plow through a human body instead, to which Nick responds:

“Oops! My bad!”

Finally deciding to end this, I take out my gun and start shooting. About three entire rounds are emptied into the back of the pickpocket's stolen car before he decides to abandon it. Exiting my own stolen car, I rush over to the thief before he can run away. Defiant to the very end, he begins to assault me with moves looking like they were taken straight out of a Bruce Lee movie. With the press of a few buttons I respond with equally as fantastic moves of my own, and soon we're locked in a Kung-Fu battle to the death. The fight reaches a smashing climax as Nick leaps about four feet off the ground and brings his boot into the pickpocket's face with crushing force, sending him flying into a conveniently placed wooden bench that splinters into thousands of pieces upon impact.

I have made absolutely none of this up.

If nothing else, True Crime: Streets of LA was ambitious. The prospect of recreating over 200 square miles of Los Angeles, Hollywood sign and street names intact, was undoubtedly a tempting feature. Throw in free-roaming elements, guns and cars, and popular music and you've got the potential for a pretty amazing game. Not to mention enough features to spark the interest of a decently large-sized audience.

Of course, potential and ambition are one thing, and execution is another. While it is true that True Crime had big ideas and great potential, the fact is that it had almost laughably poor execution. It oftentimes gets to the point where you start to wonder if the game is taking itself seriously or not. Whatever the case, the whole package comes across as a mess.

True Crime obviously attempts to capture the feel of those B-movie quality action-thrillers centered around cops (my first question here would be why, but that's irrelevant). The aforementioned protagonist, Nick Kang, is a strikingly stereotypical rendition of your “loose-cannon cop.” He walks with a distinct swagger, spits out a seemingly inexhaustible stream of one-liners, and even knows how to properly slide over the front hood of a car (a feat that can be accomplished in-game!). He is the walking picture of cool… if you're around 12, that is. Asserting his “tough” attitude in the most unnecessary of places and equipped with dialogue that mostly falls flat (”see this? This is my BOOMSTICK!”), he generally comes across as overly dramatic and silly.

As does most everything else in the game. The general plot is a somewhat odd mix of action, drama, and suspense. Nick, who as we know is a cop back patrolling the streets of Los Angeles after a suspension, eventually gets tangled up in a mystery involving his past and the death of someone close to him. From that basic plot point the way the story will actually play out will vary.

One of the game's most advertised features is the concept of the “branching story line.” Depending on your actions and/or performance in missions, you will travel along different paths, or “story lines” of the overall plot. One thing the game made sure to note is that you will “NEVER HAVE TO REPEAT A MISSION TWICE,” implying that failure in a mission can simply set new events in motion rather than giving you a “Game Over” screen.

Take that statement with a pillar of salt, because after skipping about three or four key missions, you'll find your game at an abrupt and unsatisfying end.

The main plot along the default “story line” is straightforward enough, but to avoid spoilers let's say it has its questionable moments… its many questionable moments.

Branch off from the main plot a little, which you probably will, and you might just have to put down your controller and stare at the screen in disbelief. The plot takes off in the most ridiculous of directions- a few priceless examples including sneaking through a spa and ending up in a one-man battle against the entire staff, hand-to-hand combat with a dancer of a strip club, and... shooting a floating tiki-head. It almost feels like the writers decided not to develop the sub-plots as- ahem- well as the main plot, and started to throw in things off the top of their heads.

Actually, that's probably exactly what happened.

The game's missions themselves lack serious variety. Nearly every mission can be divided into three categories- shooting, driving, and fighting. However, the problem is that there is almost NO difference between different missions of the same category- the first shooting or fighting mission is basically the last shooting or fighting mission, but with different scenery or different events surrounding the encounter.

Yet, compared to the rollercoaster plot and the shallow missions, the actual gameplay makes both seem intricate and deep respectively. If an hour was spent thinking up the plot, about seven minutes must have been spent on gameplay mechanics, six of those seven watching Fists of Fury and the last on implementation. Nearly every single aspect of the core gameplay, be it the shooting, driving, or fighting, is either broken or not well thought out.

As stated before, the game is set in an expansive, free-roaming representation of modern Los Angeles- well, okay, not exactly. You see, it's only free-roaming during certain missions. An odd way of going about the free-roaming concept, I'm sure, but stay with me.

Nick is conveniently armed with two upgradeable pistols, containing nigh-limitless ammo. However, in a decision that surely could have only been made while someone was under the influence, whenever he decides to aim at anything, the game slows down into an automatic “bullet-time,” complete with huge targeting reticule and (overly) dramatic slow-motion effects. While it may seem cool for a while, the thing you have to realize is that whenever you want to aim at anything, be it a car, a bad guy, or a stop-sign, the game will automatically and melodramatically slow down.

Every.

Single.

Time.

Not only does this kind of take the skill and/or challenge out of aiming, but it also gets really annoying. Fast.

But there is another option! Enter True Crime's brilliant auto-targeting system, which is like its name implies, fully automatic- meaning it comes on whenever it feels like it and targets whoever it wants. Apparently there was some thought put into it, because it'll (thankfully) come on only when there are threats in the vicinity, but all of its practicality ends there. When someone is auto-targeted, your view and orientation is automatically locked on that person. Switching the auto target towards a more suitable foe- which has been known to target an enemy an entire floor beneath my location in a building- involves a spastic jerking and rotating of the analog sticks in an attempt to “break” the connection with you and the current target, all while the true threat happens to be casually emptying your life bar. Of course, you could simply eliminate the current target and wait for the auto target to make a smarter choice. When shooting towards the floor at an enemy below you, however, this may be a slight problem.

Shootouts in the game are an interesting affair. They usually consist of jamming the “R1” button wildly at every target that comes up, a tactic that can get you through 99% of the game's firefights. On about one occasion you might actually want to use “precision targeting,” and on even less occasions you'll want to use the “duck-and-cover” button (complete with automatic one-liner by Nick!).

If the on-foot shooting action ever gives you too much of a headache, at least you have access to every single car you see. Apparently one of the perks to being an EOD agent is the right to take anyone's car… whenever you want.

The driving in the game is simplistic at best. Every car on the road can be divided into three categories- the “slow” cars (for decoration), the “medium cars, and- you guessed it- the “fast” cars. Besides the speed, color, and shape, there is essentially no difference between vehicles. In an extent to conceal the inherent simplicity, the makers included a vast variety of “special car moves.” Only one problem- they're utterly useless. I did not use a single one during my play of the game. Most of the time, liberal pressing of the “X” button with periodic taps of the “SQUARE” button will accomplish any vehicular task you set yourself out for.

And as for the fighting- I hesitate to call it even that- if ever there were a worse and more impractical fighting system, I'd like to see it.

Firstly, even in a game such as this, the whole thing seems totally out of place. Seeing the leather-clad Nick pull off a “spinning jumping money kick” is just plain bizarre. Yet you'll forgive the weirdness once you get acquainted with the actual system itself. There is no skill whatsoever involved; it is all button mashing. That's just not coming from me- using any sort of “technique” or “strategy” not only will give you no discernible advantage, but the system is so broken that I don't think any true ones exist. It is nearly (if not literally) impossible to guard correctly, and forget about anticipating when you're supposed to attack. Throw a kick at the shins and it might register as a hit or it might simply slip by- don't even mind if your opponent is guarding his legs, his head, or is just standing there in a half-drunken state. Therefore, fighting can be either incredibly easy or impossibly hard- there's just no middle ground. Sometimes, when facing the very same opponent, you will get absolutely mauled the first round and be untouchable the second.

What's worse is that the game includes a fighting segment about every three or four missions, effectively forcing you to cope with the broken system more than should be legal.

For a city that was supposedly “faithfully” recreated, Los Angeles looks a bit generic. Sure, all the “famous” sites are intact, and there are residential and commercial areas where there should be, but in quite a few places it would be very possible for an LA native to have no idea where they were (if it weren't for the street signs). Building models are repeated quite a bit, as are special “realistic touches” (the same kind of road kill in the middle of three different roads? Ew.).

The actual game appears a bit unpolished. Jagged features are present on Nick himself, let alone the pedestrians. While the game does boost nice effects, like “FULLY DESTRUCTIBLE INTERIOR ENVIRONMENTS,” the rest of the game looks so unimpressive that you tend to overlook them (the exact opposite of what the developers intended, I'm sure).

As for the sound, the less said (or heard) the better. Similar to most low-budget made-for-TV movies, the voice acting is laughable. The sound effects are also not that great quality (gunshots sound like… I don't know, but not gunshots). If you intend to get any enjoyment out of the soundtrack, you'd better have a reasonably large appreciation for modern rap and hip-hop… because that's all the music consists of, and nothing else. Not that bad at all if you appreciate it, but if not… so much for a wider audience.

True Crime: Streets of LA is all novelty and no substance. Once the awe of actually being in Los Angeles wears off- once the gimmick of bullet-time becomes tiring- there really isn't anything left to keep you playing at all. In fact, the rest of the game will probably turn you off. It's actually sad when you think of what this could have been.

Reviewer's Score: 2/10, Originally Posted: 06/30/06