How does the saying go? Jack of all trades, master of none. This describes True Crime perfectly. Originally meant to be a competitor against the GTA series, sadly this game just doesn't cut it. The story is complete and utter crap. The game follows the story of a rookie cop who is not well liked by his fellow police because he doesn't play things by the book. Stop me if you've heard this before...oh, wait you have. Basically any cop cliche that was made famous in the movies was placed in this game. The voiceovers are decent but the voice actors have nothing to work for. In the gameplay department, this is where 'jack of all trades' comes to mind. This game has elements from fighters, shooters and racing games. Hand to hand combat would be interesting if it didn't require you to simply button mash most enemies to defeat them. The racing engine has some physics problems as cars readily spin out of control and crash. The worst, to me, though is the shooting engine. The control scheme for gunplay makes no sense. Since they are ripping off other games, they threw in Max Payne's bullet time. Basically you have to hold the trigger down to enter slow mo. This creates the annoying habit of trying to shoot at targets in normal time and accidentally entering bullet time. Now that I've got the bad parts out of the way, now lets get to some of the few good points in the game. The game recreates the city of Los Angeles to a fairly accurate degree. Yes there are repeated houses but overall it really does feel like you're in LA. The game utilizes a unique system where you get points for completing missions. You use these points to attempt driving, shooting and hand to hand tests. Successful completion unlocks new fighting moves, new driving and shooting techniques. Also the game has a unique good cop/ bad cop system that lets you explore the ramifications of your gaming style. The mini game between some missions that lets you solve various randomly generated crimes is nice but doesn't add anything to the game, nor replay value. simply said,it you're looking for GTA, look elsewhere. If you can endure the unintelligent story and bad controls, then maybe you should try True Crime: Streets of LA.
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