True Crime is a series oft forgotten by the gaming world, surpassed by its spiritual successor, Sleeping Dogs. Languishing as nothing more than a “GTA Clone”, however. Both games are more than meets the eye.
Today I’m focusing on the first entry. Streets of LA. Effectively, its an RPG, but one where you don’t consciously make choices. The story and the protagonist's fates are shaped through your actions. It’s in the literal sense, stealth fails, dying, failed objectives, and your successes.
You play as Nick Kang, a puckish rogue who joins the “Elite Operations Division” of the LAPD. He joins the division after being recently suspended due to excessive force; his father also served but disappeared after being indicted. Reviews criticized Kang’s character at the time but reality is, his character was just too early for this era of games. His demeanor and attitude isn’t too dissimilar from Nathan Drake; so if you like Drake, you’ll like Kang.
From the very first tutorial you craft your own experience. The game opens with a shooting tutorial where you have to hit a certain number of targets, most games should you fail would prompt you to retry but not True Crime. Should you pass or fail you’ll receive different mission end cutscenes either complimenting your shooting or questioning your abilities, either way the story progresses.
Welcome to True Crime Streets of LA, nothing stops your journey, not even death. Each mission has branching dialogue, scenes, and even scenarios depending on how you do. Fail a stealth mission, deal with the consequence, die, patch yourself back up and get a new lead. Your competence or incompetence affects the overall plot and the events of the story, you can end up on wild goose chases or ambush your unexpecting foes. The story itself is enjoyable with a charismatic set of characters all voiced by A–List celebrity talent including Christopher Walken. Cutscenes are very much rooted in the time of early 2000s action, slow motion bullet dodges, physical humour, the lot.
True Crime features a Good Cop/Bad Cop meter, an early preview in what would become a 7th generation staple, the morality system. Good Cop points are earned by tackling side objectives, incapacitating enemies, and passing missions. Bad Cop points are rewarded when you kill innocents, kill enemies during stealth, and fail objectives. You have an incentive to play nice as doing so gives you a section at each chapter to upgrade yourself. You’re dropped into the streets of LA and can choose to either upgrade your guns, melee, or car. Weapon upgrades include things such as faster reloads and scopes, vehicle upgrades net you faster cars accessible from your garage, and melee upgrades allow you new finishers in combat.
Gameplay is split into three sections, gunplay, melee, and driving. Shooting is boiled down to just moving and holding the trigger due to a generous auto aim, but the environments and destruction make up for the lack of engagement. Melee is the more interesting one, it plays like beat em up with your standard punches, kicks, and grabs. The goal here is to stun your enemies and perform finishers on them, this is where you melee upgrades come into play; however, you’re likely just to button mash at these times and become innately familiar with “Monkey Kick!”. Regardless, melee environments react to your destruction, punch someone into a stove and it’ll explode, throw them into some shelves and they’ll collapse its dynamic and help pack the extra punch. The driving sections are your standard affair, there’s a handful of car chases and the objective is always to stop your pursuee via a load of bullets, fortunately everyone you chase is immune to explosions.
Back to the story, the choices you make run deep. You really do change Kang’s motivations and personality. Should you be completely incompetent you’ll go down an apt path, to an ending leaving many of your questions unsolved. In one great instance you have to save your brother, however, should you fail to arrive in time, you’ll find him dead. Completely shifting Nick’s mental state into pure rage. While the following mission set ultimately conjoins with other branches, your journey there makes the difference. On the opposite end Nick can possess a completely nonchalant attitude which is honestly jarring, especially when he faces an actual dragon.
True Crime Streets of LA is a fun sixth generation romp with great replay value, lambasted in Grand Theft Auto’s shadow. Whatever the marketing at the time may have tried to say, it really does try its own thing and stands out as an interesting unique take on the open world genre in hindsight.
Also, did I mention you can play as Snoop Dogg?
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