Marcus Reed, a former hardened criminal turned PDNY (there's already controversy from the NYPD regarding the game, which the organization feels portrays New York cops unfairly), is the new protagonist. As with the last title, there's a thin plot worthy of a 3 a.m. movie on ActionMAX upon which to hang the action. The game opens on Christmas 2000 as Marcus walks into a crackhouse, bloodied and beat-up, and proceeds to kill just about every last mofo in the building, which gives Streets of LA vets a refresher course in the blazing shootouts that pepper the series … just in case they forgot. The sequence is appropriately violent and profane, as one would expect from True Crime. His father's friend, a PDNY officer, saves Marcus's life during the shootout and gives him an ultimatum: get on the right side of the law or face the strong arm of it. He picks the former instead of the latter.
It seems as though the team at Luxoflux has adopted the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" adage at this point in production in regards to driving, fighting, and shooting. The firing system seems unchanged from the last game. Players still have the option of twitchy, rapid-fire during shootouts, or honing in with Precision Targeting, which is used to subdue suspects or blow out tires. The hand-to-hand combat system also seemed fairly similar to the last game, although it wasn't made clear if or what kinds of improvements have been made.
Driving feels largely unchanged from the last game -- the same exercises of driving while shooting, hand-braking for hairpin turns, and other elements are still intact. The most noticeable change is when Marcus hops into a car and players hear Bobby Womack's "Across 110th Street." The soundtrack feels like it cribbed a page from the Book of Tony Hawk. Whereas Streets of LA's music was a mishmash of hungry up-and-coming West Coast hip-hop artists sprinkled with some metal and classic West Coast gangsta rap, NYC taps into New York's rich hip-hop history, delivering classics like Nas' "N.Y. State of Mind" and Run DMC's "Sucker MC's," along with hot New York indie rock bands like The Rapture.
New York itself is accurately mapped, although admittedly, in spite of New York's size, it will probably be easier to navigate than LA's eclectic streets, since it's mainly grids. The action starts off in Times Square, and it looks fairly realistic, except that it seems sleazier in the game than it does in the actual post-Giuliani Manhattan, where there are fewer ads for porn and way more for Broadway shows and cellphone providers. There are crime stats broken down on maps. Supposedly, Marcus' crime-fighting improves the overall look of an area. Does this mean that he'll get the hook-up at the Virgin Megastore in Union Square for cleaning up the high-crime plagued East Village? Doubtful, but the area will certainly get a facelift. Also, the GPS system seems like it's much easier to use than Streets of LA's breakdown from Echo Park westward to Santa Monica.
