True Crime: Streets of LA Review December 01, 2003

Streets of LA in the LA Convention Center

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Our history with True Crime stretches back all the way to E3 of 2002. We remember first seeing it there in its early stages, and thinking that it was a mix of Max Payne and Grand Theft Auto.

After facing some delays, as most games usually do, True Crime made its second E3 appearance in 2003. The game still carried its “mix of Max Payne and Grand Theft Auto” flavor, but was obviously much closer to release.

True Crime finally hit stores (and the Streets of LA) in November, and we’ve played it all to find out if it’s more than what met our eye.

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All 240 Square Miles

As the name suggests, True Crime takes place in Los Angeles. While I do not live in La La Land, the game’s rendition of the City of Angels seems to be fairly accurate. You probably won’t be able to find your favorite neighbourhood game store, but all streets, avenues, and freeways are accurately named and mapped out in relation to each other. My LA experience is mostly limited to the yearly E3 experience, and surely enough, I was able to navigate my way down to downtown Los Angeles to find the convention center, right where it should be, next to the Staples Center. Too bad the Lakers weren’t playing.

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Gameplay mix

True Crime: Streets of LA is a mix of four gameplay types: driving, shooting, sneaking, and fighting. The fighting is your standard beat-em-up variety with a buttons devoted to punches, kicks, jump kicks, and grapples. Sneaking just involves moving from point A to point B without being detected. While any third person action game where the main character wields two guns at a time is immediately compared to Max Payne, the only similarities to our favorite New York cop (aside from the dual guns) are the slow-motion shoot dodges.

SIDEBAR: Developer

Luxoflux

Publisher

Activision

Platforms

Xbox, GC, PS2

Release date

November 2003

Is it GTA: Angels City?

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The driving mode is the one that reminds people most of Grand Theft Auto. You’re given complete freedom to drive all over the city, and roam wherever you wish. You can exit your vehicle at any time and start assaulting and shooting civilians how you like. In fact, you don’t even have to exit your vehicle to shoot people, though you’ll be limited to only a single gun, as the other hand has to steer the car. But unlike GTA, doing anything like that will hinder your progress. Why’s that, you ask? You’re a cop – and contrary to popular belief, LA cops aren’t allowed to brutalize whomever they wish (though excessive force against criminals is permitted in this game).

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Single Syllable Cop

Like his fellow law enforcement officers Max Payne and Jack Slate, True Crime’s protagonist also features a single syllable first and last name – Nick Kang. He’s a cop with a history of haywire, and after being suspended indefinitely by the police force for excessive violence and property, he’s recruited by Elite Operations Division (E.O.D.) as their first field agent.

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True Crime Fighter

E.O.D. or LAPD, Nick Kang can spend the entire day trying around town and ‘solving’ crimes. Think of it as a reverse Grand Theft Auto, where instead of running around and committing random acts of senseless violence, you are alerted to such acts and can then proceed to arrest or “defeat” (i.e., kill) the criminal. Arresting muggers, settling domestic disputes, chasing down car thieves will reward you points and badges (to boost your good cop/bad cop rating), but won’t do much to help you advance through the game. Though, you can redeem your earned points for upgrades to your fighting, driving, and shooting skills as well as get you new fighting moves, faster cars, and bigger guns. For the most part, solving crimes is completely optional, but doing so can make your progress through the story easier with better skills and can also give you a better ending.

SIDEBAR: Nick Kang’s real last name is Wilson, but after having moved back to Hong Kong and wanting to fit in being a half-Chinese, he changed his name to Kang.

True Storyteller

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The heart of True Crime lies in its story. Through out its span of eight missions, every episode in each missions serves the purpose to move the story along (there are an average of seven episodes per mission). The story is constructed in such a way that cut scenes are all linked by a single game type. An episode is usually simple stuff, such as driving to a certain destination (sometimes with a time limit), sneaking past a group of goons, beating everyone up, and filling your enemies with lead.

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Success Optional

Mind you, success is not a requirement to progress in the game. On the back of the box, True Crime boasts that “you never have to repeat the same mission twice” – and it’s true. If you make it through an episode successfully, then you’ll naturally be taken to the next one. If you fail, however, then you’ll be given the option to replay the episode or to continue the story. Different cut scenes will play depending on success or failure, but often you’ll end up at the same place regardless. There are key missions where if you fail, you’ll be sent on a different branch of the story which will result in a different ending. So, the main incentives in playing missions over again are to gain access to more upgrades and to get the best ending.

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Hitting a Girl

Fortunately, the successful completion of an episode also unlocks the ‘failure’ cut scenes and story branches, so you can go back and explore those alternate realities after you’re through with being a good cop. Even if you beat the game with the best ending, you’ll have good reason to go back and play the alternate ‘failure’ paths as they contain story and gameplay moments not found in the ‘intended’ path. For example, the alternate branch for mission four includes an absolutely unforgettable True Crime moment: beating up a bunch of strippers. Yes, that’s right, Nick Kang walks into a strip joint, and before he knows it, he’s going hand to hand with all the lovely ladies in their bras and thongs.

It’s right up there with fighting the naked tattooed twin concubines in the House of Wu.


SIDEBAR: I never knew concubines had such impressive fighting skills. Still, they were no match for my Tiger Claw!

Not that we condone violence against women. We don’t. In fact, we love women!

A Sound Effort

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Videogames are getting some very impressive soundtracks these days, and True Crime is one of those games leading the way. Not content with just using licensed tracks, Activision managed to more than 50 original music tracks performed by such renowned West Coast rap artists as Snoop Dogg, Westside Connection (Ice Cube, Mac 10, WC), E40, KAM, Caviar, Easy-E Jr., Lil ½ Dead, Bad Azz, Damizza, Young Billionaires, Sly Boogy, KoKain and Jay-O-Felony. The music to True Crime is undoubtedly ruled by hip-hop and rap, though there are the odd rock/metal tracks by Megadeth, I Mother Earth, and The Deftones.

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“Bring me everyone.”

Equaling the effort put into the soundtrack talent is the crew of professional actors providing the voices for True Crime. Just look at this stacked roster:

• Christopher Walken (The Rundown, Catch Me If You Can, Sleepy Hollow)
  
• Gary Oldman (Air Force One, The Fifth Element, Léon)
  
• Michael Madsen (Kill Bill, Reservoir Dogs, Grand Theft Auto III)
  
• Russell Wong (Romeo Must Die)
  
• Michelle Rodriguez (The Fast and the Furious, Resident Evil, SWAT)
  
• Ron Perlman (Star Trek: Nemesis, Blade II)
  
• CCH Pounder (ER, The Shield)
  
• James Hong (Art of War, Blade Runner)
  
• Mako (Pearl Harbor, Bulletproof Monk, Rising Sun)
  
• Keone Young (Legally Blonde 2, Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven)

Gary Oldman and Christopher Walken

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Gary Oldman voices two very different characters, and with neither of them would you be able to tell that it’s him. Gary Oldman does what he does best, and that’s to become a total chameleon. How often does this guy even act in his native English accent?

The vocal highlight to True Crime: Streets of LA is Christopher Walken, who plays George, an old-timer cop and semi-father figure to Nick Kang. George opens and closes the story with narration, and provides both positive and negative comments when in a training facility getting upgrades. Walken’s delivery of his lines is perfect, and often hilarious. If laying the smackdown on strippers is the unforgettable gameplay moment, then Christopher Walken owns the most unforgettable quote in the game:

“Treat your gun like a woman – hold it firmly in your hands; take aim at what you want, and then… fire off a few rounds into your target.”

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Yup, they have those

Sound effects? With such great talent behind the soundtrack and voice acting, the sound effects have a lot to live up to, and for the most part, they’re more than adequate. Punches, kicks, and gunshots are all delivered with a subtle kick from your subwoofer (crank it up for less subtlety).

The graphics of True Crime have a hard time keeping up with the effort put into the soundtrack and shows obvious signs of being held back by multiplatformitis. The outdoor environments bear a resemblance to what you’ve seen in Grand Theft Auto III, and the shooting/action sequences look similar to those in Dead to Rights. While the textures may be acceptable on the PlayStation 2, they are on the bland side considering what the GameCube and Xbox are capable of producing.

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The Dogg Father

Just prior to the release of True Crime, Activision announced that Snoop Dogg is an unlockable, playable character. videogame. After collecting all the Dogg Bones in LA (or entering in a simple code), Dogg Patrol mode opens up where you can play as Snoop rolling through the streets in a custom convertible, complete with hydraulics, while looking for criminals to take down. Snoop doesn’t get his own story mode, but it is still a neat easter egg.


SIDEBAR: Disappointingly, the Xbox version of True Crime does not feature the ability to load custom soundtracks.

Final Verdict

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