True Crime: New York City (Xbox)

This game is full of bugs--some are kind of funny, while others completely break the game.

When you grab a random pedestrian, you can slam his or her head into a car until you wear yourself out, usually without much consequence. It's oddly entertaining to dent the hood of a cab with an old lady's head, only to have her curse you out and then walk off nonchalantly.

That's just one of the many completely illogical sights you'll see in this game. The developer did a good job of capturing the physical geography of the city, but the life within the city feels completely unnatural. There are only a few different character models for non-story characters, and you'll often see whole crowds of the same exact character walking down a street. You'll also notice that there are about 10 Crown Victoria-type cars to every one of any other type. It's also a bit strange to see the same character model used as a prostitute and also a delivery driver cruising around in a big box truck. The sound is way off too, and sometimes you'll hear a person on the street talk in two or three accents while spouting off random--and usually very profane--phrases.

Those types of odd glitches are everywhere in this game, along with some seriously crippling bugs. There are bugs that will make you randomly fall through the ground into a bunch of nothingness where you'll eventually die, bugs that make textures change when you get in and out of a car, bugs that cause you to inadvertently break a scripted sequence, thus making it impossible to complete a mission, and one huge bug in a later mission in the Xbox version of the game that makes it impossible to beat the game. Though considering how unpleasant everything else in the game is, maybe this version's relative brevity is a blessing in disguise. There are also collision-detection issues that require you to try several times to grapple a person, and edge-detection problems that cause you to get stuck on the edge of a platform and just tweak out for a while. That's not all--the game will actually freeze up entirely from time to time, which can be especially aggravating if you don't save your game often.

The graphics look about the same in each of the three console versions of the game. That is, they all look real bad. It isn't a matter of dull textures or blocky character models (which this game has plenty of); it's a matter of a frame rate that constantly hitches and snags. When we say constantly, we mean that the game will seize up for a fraction of a second every three or four seconds, especially while driving. If you're driving and you're about to hit something, the game will stop for a moment just before impact. To draw your attention to this problem, the sound also cuts out as the game hits these snags. The on-foot missions in indoor areas fare a little better in terms of the frame rate, but they don't look especially good. There are also some pretty ugly clipping issues here too. Sometimes Marcus' feet will melt right into the ground, and you can buy a cowboy hat that looks bizarre because Marcus' cornrows will often clip right through the brim of the hat, if the hat isn't already floating several inches off his head.

There's some real talent on hand to provide the character voices, but it feels wasted on the cliché characters and uninteresting story.

The sound is actually not bad when it isn't skipping and cutting out while you're driving around. The soundtrack includes licensed music from Redman, Blue Oyster Cult, The Misfits, Danzig, GrandMaster Flash, and more. You can rank each song according to your preference, so if you hate one song you can give it zero stars, and it won't come up in the random playlist that you hear as you drive around. There's some good voice talent on hand, but it feels wasted on this mess of a game. Christopher Walken and Laurence Fishburne both have prominent roles here, but it seems as though they were included for the sake of including some celebrity voice talent, not because they actually bring anything to the game. The dialogue in the game is composed almost entirely of the "F" word and variations thereof. The profanity is used to the extent that it sounds foolish rather than edgy or tough. The sound effects are all standard gunshots and explosions, and none of them are particularly remarkable. The vehicle sounds are somewhat varied, and it does sound cool when you commandeer some elderly woman's exotic sports car and roar off down the street.

True Crime: New York City should be avoided regardless of whether or not you enjoyed the first True Crime. The gameplay has a few almost-decent spots, but the technical problems far outweigh any faint hope this game ever had of being enjoyable. If you're curious about what a video game looks like before it goes through adequate testing and quality assurance, then by all means give this one a try. Otherwise, stay away, because it's a waste of your time and money.

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Activision Inc.

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Amazon.com Marketplace	$4.75	Yes
Amazon.com	$4.75	Yes
	$18.99	Yes

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