The Crew review script

The Crew review script:

welcome to the crew, a racing game merged with an mmo, some rpg
elements and a fuckload of space to explore

having played this game for a considerable amount of time now,
i think i have been adequately exposed to the source to give my
opinionated stance on what the game does right and wrong, and
while it does a bunch of stuff right, there is some stuff that
thoroughly irks me, starting off with the inconsistency of
traffic models;

the traffic, in general, is not important but for the sake of
having the negative-to-positive note a reviewer is obliged to go
by, i'll do it. the cars in traffic look okay for say a ps2
release, but with all the next-gen buggery it really doesn't
compete with the rest of the market on that front, not to even
mention the hideous models the parked traffic has (urghh).

the AI isn't particularly clever either, taking a long time to
figure out "oh something is in my way, better wait a minute and
then slowly crawl by it.

*truck speeds off*

Oh.

anyways, i do still have a few gripes with the rest of the game
that being that the level of customization is to say the least
a little bit hellbent on body mods and not so much on stickers.

The stickers you get to choose from are, while really nice to
look at, limited because you are unable to change the colour
scheme, position and everything else you'd expect in a game
where a ford mustang can turn into a Dakar-ready beast.

under-the-bonnet modifications are also a bit unintuitive, as you
have to fulfill missions or skill challengesto unlock new parts
which you can A;
equip right away after acquiring them or B; send to the shop so
you can install it on that same care you earned it with, later.
if you wanted that part for another car though, dont fear, the
tuner shop is here.

when you go to the tuner shop, the part you earned will be
available for purchase on any other car. you heard me though.
purchase. its understandable on one hand since you cant just
clone a part, but after having worked very very very hard for
all my level 50 platinum parts i want to shove them on every
goddamn car i own without having to pay money for it again.

And also, the one that puts all of the other
gripes to shame is the no "new save game" option.

I don't understand why Ivory Tower thought it was neccassery
to take this feature out, but I suppose it has something to
do with Ubisoft being the publisher.

Somewhere along the storyline (which is good enough for a
racing game but can be left aside if you dont care),
you gain a buttload of Crew Credits (which
in reality are in-game currency that can be bought with real
money, see
where i'm going with that UBISOFT? WINK WINK, NUDGE
FUCKING NUDGE, but nevertheless, you get 100k of the stuff
once you join a Faction (which is like a clan thing within
the game, fun for the hardcore, meh for the rest), and my
recommendation is to NOT SPEND A SINGLE DIME OF THOSE CREW
CREDITS ON ANYTHING BUT PERK POINTS OTHERWISE YOU WILL HATE
YOURSELF-

The Perk Points can be spent on upgrades (Perks) to your cars'
acceleration, handling and so on and so forth, but can only be
bought with Crew Credits or gained through levels.
You gain 1 Perk Point guaranteed with
every level up but do not be mistaken by this as its not nearly
enough to spend on the "neccassery" Perks.

Just take my advice and dump all your Crew Credits into Perk
Points otherwise you'll have to by a "Crew Credits Pack" to fill
in your needs (which are STUPIDLY EXPENSIVE GOOD LORD).

also i'm not sure if this is to do with my laptop not being
particularly high-end or if this is spread across all PCs, but
the game crashes a bit too much for my liking and that can get
quite frustrating.

and absolutely finally, i strongly dislike the fact you can only
see friends who are in your crew. I hope this is just a
glitch within the game and will be fixed in due time because you
can only have 4 people in 1 crew at any given time, and I'd like
to be able to play with more than just 4 people at once.

what irks me the absolute most though, is that its an
online-only game. yeah, thats pretty shit.


*Bobby Darrin - Beautiful Things plays*

However, the game isn't all doom and gloom as we now head for
the positives. The cars are gorgeous in their own ways.
I really don't have to spell it out for you, once you don't do
enough for a certain
amount of time the camera decides "lets show off this ol' gal"
and starts aimlessly hovering around the bloody thing to show
off their frankly gorgeous curves and not so curvy bits also.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmm...

moving right along

what is there to even do in the crew, besides modify your cars
to a point where they are sometimes inrecognizably altered?

well, you have choices; you can either finish the story missions
first (which i do recommend), or go play some Faction Missions.

Faction Missions are essentially endurance races for which you get
an absolute truckload of experience and dosh. A good feature about
Faction Missions though, is that you can send friends to play these
mission; don't worry, they don't have to actually do it, the game
just throws a bunch of bots with their names on into a race, lets
them run about for an hour or so and then you get dosh and rep or
you dont. Based on your friends' level, they have a higher
percentage chance to complete the mission or not, and the more
people you send, the better the chance of success.
Good way to farm money without doing a bloody thing honestly.
Though both rep and dosh more easily earned through PVP events.

PVP events are more of a post-game thing though, because this
is where the hardcore race people hover about. You'll need to
have a fully leveled-up car for each class and a lot of experience.

oh speaking of which, lets dive back a bit; what the bloody
hell is up with the cars? Essentially you have 5 classes of cars
They call them specs but fuck that, if you're gonna be an MMO,
you may aswell call them classes.

You have the Raid class, which turns every car into a burly 4x4
offroading beast that can pretty much go everywhere.

then you have the dirt class, which is specialized in dirt and
gravel roads, but can also do alright on tarmac. it doesn't
like shooting off into nowhere like the raid class though.

then you have the street class, which is the first class you un-
lock and is arguably the most boring class since it just makes
the cars go a teeny bit faster and give them customization options

along comes the Perf class, or performance for those whom are not
 stuck in the text message era, which is a better street class

and finally, you have circuit class vehicles, which are again an
upgrade to the perf class, and is the fastest class in the game.

right, back to the PVP events; you drop into a lobby with a bunch
of randoms unless you have a few people in your crew, which you
can invite via the friend system which is done well enough and
implemented very neatly in real time;

BACK TO THE PVP; bunch of
randoms + friends if you have them (boohoo), and if the lobby is
new the game randomizes who gets to pick the first race. whoever
wins the first race gets to pick the next race and after that it
turns into a point based system where the person with the most
points gets to pick the races.

one neat little feature i very much appreciate is the ability to
turn off traffic and collisions with other players, because arse-
holes who ram you off the road because they have a bigger car give
me aneurysms the size of the fucking pyramids - ANYWAY, PVPs are
a good way to grind for money and reputation.

Reputation also gives you some bonuses; depending on how much
reputation you have across the map, you gain a small bonus on your
daily login cashflow, which is nice.

The practical stuff in-game is also nifty. For example, the map is
so full of shit to do that it becomes hard to click what you
actually want unless you have eyes with a zoom functionality in
which case good on you- but for those who dont it becomes a pain.

thankfully, they added in a filter system to wade through the
metrick fuckton of quests and missions and so on.

noice.

the start menu is also neatly worked in as a sort of phone menu,
giving you access to all the main things like a mobile garage,
if you unlocked the perk, also mobile car repairs, and a tune-up
screen, where you can equip newly given parts to your car on the
go.

I dont hvae much else to say about this game other than that it's
a jolly bowl of fun especially when hosting roadtrips with a few
of your online mates, and while it does have some questionable
mechanics in some places and perhaps some missed opportunities,
like cross-class races or adding more customizability,
I'd say for me personally this is well worth the 49 euros
I paid for it. It isn't flawless but then again, especially
considering its one of the first of its kind.