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Crackdown 2 |OT| of Orbs, Freaks, and Exploding Pedestrians

Circle T

Member
Bebpo said:
You can activate it without getting out of the helicopter? I actually tried bringing a heli in, but I got out to activate it and the freaks broke the helicopter so I couldn't get back in. Was frustrating :\
I'm pretty sure you can. As long as you hover it close to the ground, you can usually activate most markers while in the chopper as long as you get real close. If not, just clear a spot with the rockets, land quickly, start it, and jump back in. Shouldn't take more than 10-15 seconds or so, and you'll be good to go. I know for sure I brought a chopper in there, but I did that one in co-op, so my friend may have initiated the beacon drop.
 

RiccochetJ

Gold Member
Bebpo said:
Cool, will try that. Is it actually useful?

I'm not quite sure yet! :lol
At night I quite enjoy sticking a mag grenade to a bus and then throwing the second grenade on the opposite side of a large mob of freaks. Slingshot bus of doom isn't the most elegant killing solution, but I'll be damned if it isn't the most amusing...
 

Wiggum2007

Junior Member
What's the deal with sequels and hexagons this generation? First Mass Effect 2, now Crackdown 2, so many hexagons! Aaaaaaaaaaaaahhh!!!
 

Bebpo

Banned
Circle T said:
I'm pretty sure you can. As long as you hover it close to the ground, you can usually activate most markers while in the chopper as long as you get real close. If not, just clear a spot with the rockets, land quickly, start it, and jump back in. Shouldn't take more than 10-15 seconds or so, and you'll be good to go. I know for sure I brought a chopper in there, but I did that one in co-op, so my friend may have initiated the beacon drop.

Yeah I brought in a chopper, activated it in the chopper and then the first giant freak threw a rock and hit my chopper causing it to crash down and burn :lol

But then for some reason the orb meter barely dropped this time. I think it was because I took out a bunch of non-radar threat grunts at the start? I dunno, but was able to beat it and then cleared the game. yay.
 

JambiBum

Member
Easiest way to clear out a block of freaks, use a slingshot. Find a spot where you can stick mags on both sides of the street. Throw one mag on one side. Grab a large vehicle and attach a mag to the side. Attach another mag to the other side of the vehicle so that the mags don't get twisted. Throw another mag across the street. Should now have a working slingshot. Pull back the car, throw, and enjoy
 

Mindlog

Member
fffffffffuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu

(still falling)
(glide suit)

To hell with trying that again. I'll get to the top of Hope Tower with the helicopter.

I like the game. It turned out much better than I was expecting (as a $40 title.) The game does seem a bit like a grade school essay where the writer is loosely paraphrasing an encyclopedia (Wikipedia?) just enough to avoid plagiarizing. I'm pretty happy with the engine/graphics. I wish more games would focus on stability, draw distance and numbers instead of loading up on the candy.

I don't like driving orbs that decide to bob and weave through crowds of civilians.

I cross my fingers for a real Crackdown 3. Keep agent progression, but take a look at Saint's Row 2 mission variety.

Overall, very pleased with my purchase.
 

Mastperf

Member
I can't get the chopper stomper achievement to work. I've tried over and over with no luck.

Ok, I figured it out. Just stay in the chopper for a while shooting freaks and it should register. You can also get the scarface achievement this way.
 

Circle T

Member
goldenpp72 said:
I have all achievements but the last, stunt rings.. Can anyone tell me if they are as hard as the original? Haven't started.
I had very little trouble with 95% of them, and all of them were considerably easier than the ones in the first game. In CD1, you basically had to drive the stupid ramp truck around to most of them in order to hit them, so just the act of getting prepared to attempt the jump was a pain. But in CD2, just about everywhere that you find a stunt ring, you will find a pile of dirt, or some rubble, shaped like a ramp that you can use. I started working on them a couple nights ago thinking I would get a handful each night, and go from there. But, I got all of them in about 3 hours. Quite easy, really.

And if you have problems, the old trick from the first game still works. Get in a car and have a co-op partner throw you through the ring. As long as you are the driver of the vehicle going through the ring, you'll get credit. A friend of mine is really bad at driving vehicles in this game, so we tried seeing if I drove through them with him in the passenger seat worked, but it does not. You need to be in the driver seat.

Oh, and just to keep my pattern of posts going, you can also use the helicopter for these as well. You need 2 people, but all it takes is a couple mag grenades. Throw one on the roof of a car, one on the bottom of the chopper, and you're set. You can get probably 80% of them that way. I did that for my buddy, since he sucks at driving. It was actually really fun that way. Since I already had all of them, they no longer showed up for me, so I was flying blind, with him directing me where they were and what heading and elevation to fly at. Some of the sequence ones were pretty tough. But, we ended up getting all of them. Chopper rules :lol
 
Woke up, played for a couple hours this morning, and inevitably ended up making my mark on the rooftop race leaderboards.

I'm in the top ten for a couple, look for me!
g/t - MightyHealthy

On the non-boasting front, I am really glad that the game turned out to be more fun and less infuriating than the original. Sure, there's some minor control changes and the plot makes me want to destroy everything I love, but I've been watching the hours go by gleefully.
 

shintoki

sparkle this bitch
I've been clearing out the red circle places...or should I say other people. :lol

Anyways, I have two left and there is one like Hope Tower, except 1/3 of the way through. there are no people left spawning and they are all either above or below the building but I can't figure out how to get to them. any ideas?
 

jkanownik

Member
God I've grown to hate this friggin game. The controls are worse than the first, some of the tower designs are awful and the setup for some of the driving orbs are just stupid. I looked fondly back on Crackdown 1 but I will not be doing the same for Crackdown 2. Some of the gameplay flaws are so ridiculous that I will probably avoid anything Ruffian does in the future.
 
jkanownik said:
God I've grown to hate this friggin game. The controls are worse than the first, some of the tower designs are awful and the setup for some of the driving orbs are just stupid. I looked fondly back on Crackdown 1 but I will not be doing the same for Crackdown 2. Some of the gameplay flaws are so ridiculous that I will probably avoid anything Ruffian does in the future.
Are you sure you're remembering Crackdown 1 correctly? I feel that every annoyance in Crackdown 2 was in the first game as well. Bouncing off walls instead of grabbing on to ledges, shitty lock on, annoying rag doll state you can't really get out of, etc.

At least they've toned down the rag doll in this game a bit (you don't fall into rag doll state for every little thing, every time), so I'd say that this game is less annoying than the first game. I still love both though and I really hope we will see Crackdown 3 in 2-3 years.
 
Finished the main story - well I say finished, it just sort of stops :lol
The underlying sandbox is as much fun as always, but I found most of the new stuff to be inferior to the original (with the exception of the orb sonar). Let's hope they get a bit more time to work on CD3.
 

soldat7

Member
One more freak lair to go. Sure, there are warts and zits and such, but for me, Crackdown 2 has absolutely delivered.

Clay Davis said:
Finished last night and was terribly disappointed by the final act.

Very disappointed overall. :/

Uh...your avatar is sorta NSFW.
 

ShapeGSX

Member
shintoki said:
I've been clearing out the red circle places...or should I say other people. :lol

Anyways, I have two left and there is one like Hope Tower, except 1/3 of the way through. there are no people left spawning and they are all either above or below the building but I can't figure out how to get to them. any ideas?

Use the helicopter. If you clear out the bottom of the building from afar, you can get low enough to hit back and trigger the location. Then pull away and take out the guys that run out of the building. Then fly up and just take out the guys as you see them. All of the Cell are in the tower, above you.

Not nearly as much fun as the Shai-Gen tower, unfortunately. Not nearly as difficult, either. :)
 

soldat7

Member
ShapeGSX said:
Use the helicopter. If you clear out the bottom of the building from afar, you can get low enough to hit back and trigger the location. Then pull away and take out the guys that run out of the building. Then fly up and just take out the guys as you see them. All of the Cell are in the tower, above you.

Not nearly as much fun as the Shai-Gen tower, unfortunately. Not nearly as difficult, either. :)

I got stuck on this one as well. That's super lame.
 

jkanownik

Member
AndyMoogle said:
Are you sure you're remembering Crackdown 1 correctly? I feel that every annoyance in Crackdown 2 was in the first game as well. Bouncing off walls instead of grabbing on to ledges, shitty lock on, annoying rag doll state you can't really get out of, etc.

At least they've toned down the rag doll in this game a bit (you don't fall into rag doll state for every little thing, every time), so I'd say that this game is less annoying than the first game. I still love both though and I really hope we will see Crackdown 3 in 2-3 years.

Probably not, but it was fresh and three years ago so I was probably more forgiving. I'm definitely running into more issues this time though. I definitely would not have remembered the first one so fondly if the game pissed me off this much.
 

RBH

Member
1zgyw5i.png

UK:

19/Jul/2010

Microsoft’s new and improved, slimmer XBox 360 console, the XBox 360 250GB (or XBox 360 S) achieves the biggest launch in the UK for a “revised” home console, surpassing the launches of both PS2 Slim and PS3 Slim and recording over two days around the same as the original Xbox 360's launch sales total back in week 48 2005.

This is even more impressive when you take into account that the original Xbox 360 was launched across two versions (Pro and Core).

A great week for Microsoft is ensured with the format holder’s XB360 exclusive title ‘Crackdown 2’ holding on to top spot in the All Formats Chart for a second week. A 36% drop in sales is not enough for it to be caught by Ubisoft’s ‘Dance on Broadway’ (-9%), which climbs 2 places to No2, only around 800 units behind ‘Crackdown 2’. Lego Harry Potter’s spell on the charts is slowly wearing off as it drops one place to No3 (-31%), while another previous No1, ‘Red Dead Redemption’ (-19%) also slips one place, down to No4.

Week 28, 2010 - Individual Formats (Units)

01 (01) 360 Crackdown 2 (Microsoft)
02 (02) WII Dance On Broadway (Ubisoft)
03 (03) WII Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo)
04 (04) 360 Red Dead Redemption (Take 2)
05 (06) WII Just Dance (Ubisoft)
06 (05) PS3 Red Dead Redemption (Take 2)
07 (23) 360 Alan Wake (Microsoft)
08 (08) 360 2010 Fifa World Cup South Africa (Electronic Arts)
09 (13) 360 Tiger Woods Pga Tour 11 (Electronic Arts)
10 (19) 360 Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision Blizzard)


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=401611
 
jkanownik said:
Probably not, but it was fresh and three years ago so I was probably more forgiving. I'm definitely running into more issues this time though. I definitely would not have remembered the first one so fondly if the game pissed me off this much.
I have to say though that Crackdown 2 brings out the flaws from Crackdown more clearly. The way the city is designed in Crackdown 2 doesn't really work as well as Crackdown 1 because of the controls. The controls are fine when you have big platforms to jump between. When you're forced to jump between small pillars instead it doesn't work quite as well. Plus you didn't have any renegade orbs in Crackdown 1, and those can really piss you off in combination with the ruined city towers that can be tough to climb and jump between. You don't really get the same flow while jumping around buildings in CD2.

Overall I love Crackdown 2, but the flaws can get really annoying at times. I'm not quite done with the game yet, and I'm still having a blast so I'm not gonna complain. Thankfully it seems that the game is selling quite well in UK at least, so I hope we'll see a Crackdown 3 that takes place in a brand new city that isn't destroyed.
 

JambiBum

Member
RBH said:
1zgyw5i.png

UK:



Week 28, 2010 - Individual Formats (Units)

01 (01) 360 Crackdown 2 (Microsoft)
02 (02) WII Dance On Broadway (Ubisoft)
03 (03) WII Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo)
04 (04) 360 Red Dead Redemption (Take 2)
05 (06) WII Just Dance (Ubisoft)
06 (05) PS3 Red Dead Redemption (Take 2)
07 (23) 360 Alan Wake (Microsoft)
08 (08) 360 2010 Fifa World Cup South Africa (Electronic Arts)
09 (13) 360 Tiger Woods Pga Tour 11 (Electronic Arts)
10 (19) 360 Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision Blizzard)


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=401611

Damn at most of the 360 stuff eating up those charts.
 

Mindlog

Member
My last agility orb: South Hope Springs Tower nearly overlooking my final agility orb from Crackdown 1. Freaky coincidence.
My last hidden orb: On the small island behind the arms factory.
My last renegade agility orb: Unity Heights South near the building that's falling over (split in half.) I HATED that freaking orb. All of the renegade orbs follow predictable paths and they're pretty easy to catch. This one eluded me for the longest time. One time I almost had it and it decided to clip down through a building to piss me off. I recovered and then it just floated away into the sky GAH. It glitched on purpose I know it. I just had to chopper drop onto it.

I actually want to find all of the journals without a map, but I'm not sure if that is going to work out.

I accidentally discovered the speed glitch on my. I hope they keep it as a feature. Let my armor transform into a Tron Bike at agility level 7.

This game would have been awesome DLC for Crackdown 1.

I hope they get to make Crackdown 3 with the vs multiplayer campaign. I see where they're going with this.

VVV Decent map, but 2 things bugged me.
Indicate North on the minimap. How did this get through testing! Maybe I just missed it.
Can't set my own waypoints. We needed this feature on occasion.

When you go to the achievement map I thought it moved the map according to what area you highlighted?
 

Maaseru

Banned
MAybe I'm wrong(please correct me), but this game has the worst map ever for this type of game. No zoom, no names no nothing , the poster that came with the game works effin better. See I;m trying to find the last orbs and the achievement screen in the pause menu says where are they to be found yet not the map or anything gives me the name of each zone. This sucks bad the worst thing about this game, they should fix it!!!! *end RAnt

498 orb!!!:D
 

Circle T

Member
Mindlog said:
Indicate North on the minimap. How did this get through testing! Maybe I just missed it.
You missed it. There is a small triangle/arrow on the outside of the map that indicates North, and rotates around the minimap as you change direction. It was there in the first game, and is there again in the second.

I agree with your wish for waypoints though. That would have been great.
 
game got A LOT more enjoyable once i hit level 4 on all my upgrades. can't wait to hit 5 and unlock more stuff.

great game if you didn't expect a massive upgrade like some people hoped for.
 
need help at the end

so on the final beacon at the tower i need some tips. i can make it to level 3 but i just fall short of passing it, im playing solo by the way. so any tips/strategies for level 3? im about to give up for good
 

goldenpp72

Member
goldenticket said:
need help at the end

so on the final beacon at the tower i need some tips. i can make it to level 3 but i just fall short of passing it, im playing solo by the way. so any tips/strategies for level 3? im about to give up for good

homing rockets are your friend man
 
Messing around with MAG grenades (the sticky spider web ones) yielded a FLYING SUV! Granted it was crazy glitchy, but since this video has been made we have been crafting it into something we can control a bit more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnO03NPSEKQ
Took video with my iPhone 4 and I was laughing, so give me a break.

Also, how do I find my remaining orbs with ease? Is there an easier way? I'm using the "start, back out, then quickly press Up" and flying around with the helicopter. Any easier methods?
 

Mindlog

Member
Circle T said:
You missed it. There is a small triangle/arrow on the outside of the map that indicates North, and rotates around the minimap as you change direction. It was there in the first game, and is there again in the second.

I agree with your wish for waypoints though. That would have been great.

I had a chance to take a closer look. It is there! I was playing Crackdown 2 and Saint's Row 2 at the same time. The N indicator is much more prominent in the latter game. Similarly, Blue Orbs on a dark field can be a bit troublesome at times.

Chopper pinging was the same way I found my last few orbs. When you have the chopper at full speed it also expands the minimap.

I was having troubles getting the chopper to pick up delivery van 2. Throwing mags on it and sticking it to the chopper did not work so we just ended up trying to hang as many things down the middle of the street as possible. Quite festive.
 

GhaleonEB

Member
AndyMoogle said:
I have to say though that Crackdown 2 brings out the flaws from Crackdown more clearly.
I agree, and thought I'd use this as a launch pad to detail some thoughts I've had simmering on the topic. There are a number of gameplay systems that Crackdown 2 just carries over from the first game, but because of changes made around them, rather than directly to them, the flaws they had are magnified.

The Camera Is Unsuited to the Game

Crackdown's camera system was pretty rudimentary, a third person camera a fixed distance from the player than can be rotated and angled up or down. It was most effective in wide-open areas, as the distance was ideal for enabling those long jumps with pinpoint landings. Where it was weakest was in close quarters. When the camera came up against an obstacle, such as a building, the camera pulls in close to the player, over the shoulder. Worse, it moves out of the way of the building, pulling over to the side and changing the viewing angle. In corners and against walls, it pulls in so close the player is pushed off the screen entirely. This had the effect of making player orientation difficult to determine, the camera difficult to control (because it's moving on its own as the player moves) and mêlée targets impossible to see.

Crackdown 2 amplifies all of these flaws by creating a more cluttered environment, more closed-in combat spaces and filling them with more targets to engage in close quarters. The Freak lairs in particular are often filled with pillars and other obstacles that cause the camera to have fits when you move past them. This is a huge problem because there are a number of dangerous enemies that have to be kept track of, namely the super Freaks that can knock me down. I ran into countless situations where I'm running away from one in order to get into rocket distance, only to have the camera pull to the side because I passed a pillar, causing me to lose sight of them and not know they had begun a charge I needed to jump over. Since those were often instantly fatal thanks to the rag doll (more on that in a sec), it was a huge issue.

The same problem showed up in numerous other situations, as rubble and transmission towers added to the game all messed with the camera even in relatively open spaces.

One other camera related issue is worth noting. When climbing, any time you grab a ledge the camera returns to center, facing the player's back at shoulder level. This wasn't a huge issue in Crackdown one, since nearly all climbing surfaces were flat; if you grabbed the side of a building, you just jumped up to the next ledge right above you to keep going. In Crackdown 2, the destruction and some altered building designs mean you have to climb up and around outcroppings, and steer your jumps onto ledges that are not right above you. The problem is, you look at your target and hit jump, only to have the camera snap back behind the player. It makes navigating the surfaces difficult. And it's especially maddening when chasing Renegade Agility Orbs; often I had one in my sights, but I'd miss a jump and grab a ledge, which would swing the camera to my back causing me to lose sight of where it went; I had to rely on radar to get going in the right direction.

It's also an issue in mêlée combat, especially Freak packs. Against walls and ledges, the camera will pull to the side and focus on the player, not the target, so I won't be able to see who I'm striking.

My ideal camera would stay facing the direction I point it in, and cut into the environment, making it translucent. MDK2 on the Dreamcast still has the best third person camera I've played in an action game, which is kind of sad.​

My Beastly Agent Should Not Crumple Like Tissue Paper When Struck

In the first Crackdown, this only came up when the player was getting nailed with explosives. It was frustrating, but only affected specific situations. In Crackdown 2, Ruffian kept the system, but added new enemies that can 1) knock the player down and 2) keep hitting the player while they're down. On Psychotic difficulty (what I played on), this meant one strike from the super Freaks meant death, as 2-3 blows was enough to kill. I had at least 50 - probably more - deaths caused by being beaten to death while I waited tried to get up from an initial knockdown - from nearly full health. A powerful strike should send the player flying, but recovery must be quick if the enemy has the ability to juggle.​

You Can't Make Fun of The First Game's Announcer Unless You Have Fixed Him in the Sequel

I admit, I smiled at the homage to the "I can see my house from here," line in Crackdown. It was a cheerful nod to how inane the Crackdown 1 announcer was. The problem is, the dude in the sequel is even worse. He seems to have a couple of buckets of line types, and most of them spout randomly. He'd tell me what Agility Obs do when I was Level 5 Agility; how to level my Driving skill by completing races when I was in the starting gate to a race; he'd tell me how to capture a supply point when I was working on the 25th one. The man was an idiot (and a newly profane one, at that). Halo, on the Xbox and released in 2001, had thousands of lines of context-specific AI dialog. I expect at least that level of intelligence applied to a game like this, nearly ten years later.​

No, I Don't Want to Target the Agency Car, I Want to Target the Guy With the Grenade Launcher

The targeting system in Crackdown wasn't perfect, but it worked. In Crackdown 2, it's both less accurate at identifying targets, and has more of them to pick from. I had situations where I'd be trying to take aim at a sniper on the next building, but pulling the trigger would target some object way off to the side, even though I was aiming right on the sniper. Others, such as the aforementioned car versus grenade launcher dude, had more dire consequences. And with the addition of Freaks into the mix, you just needed to give up targeting entirely. This system needs to be overhauled.​

There are other areas, but those were the biggest ones that took away from the game, in my view. I'd mentioned how mêlée combat was hurt in the camera section, but it bears repeating. And as AndyMoogle said, running and jumping took a hit from the clutter and broken surfaces. I really hope that if there's a Crackdown 3 (and I do hope there is one), the core gameplay is worked on, and not just the context we get to employ it in.
 

MMaRsu

Member
Should be getting this tomorrow!! Traded it for RDR :).

Wasn't gonna go back to that game anyway, especially after
not being able to play with john
< only read that shit if you finished RDR.
 

Haunted

Member
The demo was one of the worst I've seen and played in recent memory. Maybe I just don't "get" it, but while I thought the first game was good and clean platforming fun with some embarrassing gunplay and driving thrown in, the second one just seems like a complete mess.

I've read that most of the original team went on to make APB instead of Crackdown 2, and I think it really shows. :/


AndyMoogle said:
Are you sure you're remembering Crackdown 1 correctly? I feel that every annoyance in Crackdown 2 was in the first game as well. Bouncing off walls instead of grabbing on to ledges, shitty lock on, annoying rag doll state you can't really get out of, etc.
I think a big part of this is that people were more forgiving since it was an effort [relatively] early in this gen. Now, a couple years later and with that much time between games, people are more critical of the same flaws. I think.
 

goldenpp72

Member
Haunted said:
The demo was one of the worst I've seen and played in recent memory. Maybe I just don't "get" it, but while I thought the first game was good and clean platforming fun with some embarrassing gunplay and driving thrown in, the second one just seems like a complete mess.

I've read that most of the original team went on to make APB instead of Crackdown 2, and I think it really shows. :/

Sounds like the new everyone left rare and all they made on xbox sucked but i never played the full games kinda thing. CD2 is very much crackdown with improvements and some draw backs.
 

Haunted

Member
goldenpp72 said:
Sounds like the new everyone left rare and all they made on xbox sucked but i never played the full games kinda thing. CD2 is very much crackdown with improvements and some draw backs.
Grabbed by the Ghoulies was pretty good!
 

goldenpp72

Member
Haunted said:
Grabbed by the Ghoulies was pretty good!

It actually wasn't bad, nor were any of the 360 titles they made.

But they all left!!

I have all achievements in cd1/2, in that context, cd2 was a vast improvement over crackdowns broken ass design (stunt rings.. lol)

But cd2 has some inferior aspects as well, but i'd say if both released the same day cd2 is a more content complete game.
 

soldat7

Member
Haunted said:
I've read that most of the original team went on to make APB instead of Crackdown 2, and I think it really shows. :/

Not entirely true.

GhaleonEB said:

You and I see things quite differently, it seems. I'm not saying that Crackdown 2 was/is a perfect game (I have plenty of criticisms that I'll detail at some point), but I honestly wasn't bothered (or even experienced) 90% of what you just talked about.
 

GhaleonEB

Member
soldat7 said:
You and I see things quite differently, it seems.
Oh, I think that's pretty well established. :p

soldat7 said:
I'm not saying that Crackdown 2 was/is a perfect game (I have plenty of criticisms that I'll detail at some point), but I honestly wasn't bothered (or even experienced) 90% of what you just talked about.
Honestly, I'm not sure how anyone can go through the game not experiencing those issues. I think some may be exaserbated by the difficulty setting; failing to lock onto the right target for a few moments and getting a knock down by the super Freaks can be fatal on Psychotic, which is what I played the game at. I'm not sure if they are fatal on lower difficulty settings. And you might simply not have been bothered by many of the things I described; issues affect people differently, and I'll happily point out that I'm very picky about certain things in games; camera issues, for instance, drive me NUTS. But I think I was pretty fair in describing how those system worked, for instance the camera. That's just how the camera works. Whether that bugs you or causes issues for you, I can't say. But it caused my death - and more often, frustration and annoyance - quite often.

On the whole, I enjoyed much of Crackdown 2. And to be fair to it, I played only one session of (two player) co-op and none of the MP, partly because I'm not that interested in those things. For some things I prefer a solo experience, so there are quite likely joys to be found in the game I'm missing out on and thus discounting.

But on the whole, what I played of Crackdown 2 - solo campaign on Psychotic to completion for about 30 hours - was a lesser game than Crackdown 1 was. More issues, less polish, more frustration and a number of additions that I did not value.

One last lament: there was no need for the training sequence at the beginning. Forced, unskippable training sequences are one of my biggest pet peeves in gaming, and there was no need for it in this game. Crackdown 1 didn't need it, and the sequel added nothing that warranted one. Good game design - Halo, for instance - builds the tutorial directly into the gameplay of the early goings, so the player learns to play the game by playing the game. A small nuisance, but one I wanted to mention.

As a side note, I'll stop hammering the game now. I tend to post a lot about games I enjoy (see: Halo, Crackdown, Oblivion) and say my piece and move on from games I don't (Gears of War 2, CoD4, the new Banjo - and now Crackdown 2). CD2 was a good 'tweener game while I wait for Reach, but I'm not planning to revisit it.
 
So uh... When's this game get fun? I've plugged about 4 hours in so far and it just seems like a buggy, opressive mess.

After the intro I got sick of the terrible low-level gunplay so I went and hoofed it to another part of the city and got some awesome machine gun. Came back to the starting area to do some of the mission stuff, only to find that the first target I went to was unreachable with my level agility. This is like the 4th target in the game, and I can't get it with level 2 agi. Fucking whatever. So I go to the next one. It's on a rooftop. Lots of snipers, lots of dudes spawning right behind me, lots of waiting around to get headshots. I clear every dude on the screen, but it won't trigger. I'm just standing there, waiting for it. The dude it wants me to kill is at the ground level, running straight into a wall. So of course I fail that. And die from the fall.

So I say fuck it and decide to screw around. Pick a spawn in the complete opposite side of the start. There's a nearby stronghold, so I run in and start the chopper call and get to cover. As I drop behind a wall, I find myself in a crowd of 50+ civilians all running around inside this little block. By now the Cell shitheads have all spawned and they are blazing their chainguns like mad and between them and the civs, the framerate is about 10 fps. I start clearing them out, civilians respawning and freaking out the entire time, and as I work my way down the street some fucks show up behind me and just go crazy with homing rocket spam. It doesn't even hurt, I'm pelted a dozen times and I don't even lose shields, I just flop around and around unable to move. Eventually I clear it and one of the helicopters crashes while lowering in.

So yea, Crackdown 2. First impression is that the city is impressively large, and that everything else fucking sucks. Oh and I've only done the very first freakhole, but fuck me I never want to do that again.
 
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