your agent levels up. Pummel foes’
faces and your melee powers grow,
increasing your strength until agents
can chuck lorries about like they were
12-tonne frisbees. Mow dudes down
in cars or catapult through one of the
game’s 50 stunt rings to improve your
driving stats. Make your enemies go
boom with rocket launchers, and your
hero’s explosive skills get a boost,
eventually unlocking the likes of the
blackhole-aping Singularity Grenade.
By rewarding variety and invention,
Crackdown 3 ’s superhero scuffles stay
far fresher than they should.
Road ready
Driving also fares better than you’d
expect. Thanks to a pleasingly throw-
about handling model, drifting around
the roads of New Providence is a lot
more enjoyable than steering the likes
of Watch Dog 2’s unconvincing cars.
The Agency Vehicle adds further flair
to Crackdown’s garage.
As your driving skills improve, you
unlock new forms of this morphing
supercar. The Agency Lightning is a
souped-up speed demon that can
elegantly weave between traffic
thanks to its handy sideswipe, the
Spider can hop around like a rhino-
sized frog and drive up the sides of
buildings, while the tank-like Minotaur
causes havoc with its turret. As
versatile rides go, the Agency Vehicle
is right up there with Arkham Knight’s
adaptable Batmobile.
New Providence is another
success story. Though its granular
details can’t compete with GTA V’s
exquisitely designed Los Santos, this
cityscape provides a dizzyingly vertical
playground. Whether you’re jumping
around the gaudy slums of Westport,
with its neon sex signs, or clambering
up the roof of Ashwood Marina’s race-
stand as toxic pools of Chimera goo
bubble away in the background, New
Providence is one of the more varied
sandboxes you’ll find on Xbox One.
For all the intoxicating appeal
of playing out a superhero power
fantasy, Crackdown 3 doesn’t feel
as fully formed or ambitious as it
should. Considering it’s been cooking
away since 2014, it’s not unfair to
expect more from one of Xbox’s key
franchises in 2019. While Crackdown 3
is prettier than the original (even if you
play Realtime Worlds’ classic at 4K onXbox One X), the core experience has
barely moved on since 2007.Tower trip
Yes, this is a generously stuffed open
world. With hundreds of orbs to hoover
up, rooftop races to run and colossal
towers to scale, it’s easy to lose hours
and hours in New Providence thanks
to these gameplay loops. Yet when
you think about what the likes of GTA
Online and the recent Anthem offer in
terms of shared world sandbox thrills,
Crackdown 3’s campaign, which also
supports two-player online co-op,
starts to look a bit long in the tooth.
After such a glacial wait, it’s not
unreasonable to expect more. Still, in
spite of its pared-back ambitions, it is
such a chorus line of brainless, sugar
rush thrills, you’ll rarely be anything
less than entertained. Let’s just hope
we don’t have to wait until 2024 for
Crackdown 4 to arrive. QWRECKING
RALPH
Crackdown 3’s
Wrecking Zone
multiplayer wasn’t live
at time of writing. The
five-on-five online
mode launches with
an initial three maps
that take advantage
of cloud-powered
destruction. Though
this ambitious feature
didn’t make the main
campaign, the
vertically layered
maps of Wrecking
Zone offer towers,
statues and other
structures that can all
be flattened by
gunfire. Set in a
simulation, the boxy
arenas have a
Tron-like flavour to
them. We will have
more Wrecking
Zone impressions
next issue.“Crackdown 3
doesn’t feel as
fully formed or
ambitious as
it should”
OXM VERDICT
Silly and thrilling,
if repetitive, this
tardy hero was just
about worth the
long wait.7
LEFT The game
gives you more
than enough
stuff to ride
in, smash and
leap over.
FAR LEFT We like
to go above and
beyond when
making sure our
enemies are well
and truly dead.Cloudgine, Ruffian Games, Elbow Rocket and Certain Affinity all worked on the gameMore Xbox news at gamesradar.com/oxm THE OFFICIAL XBOX MAGAZINE 067REVIEW