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Meet The Crew – pimping rides and warring factions
The Crew, Ubisoft’s massive open world racer lands in December. We take a look under its hood.
If you’ve ever wanted to cruise through the open landscape of the United States, but you can’t afford the airline ticket, it’s worth looking out for The Crew. Ubisoft’s open world racer, drops in a few months’ time and it’s a vast, sprawling beast of a game and it’s geared towards sucking as many hours out of your life as possible.
Quietly delayed by a few weeks, the game doesn’t ship until December but that hasn’t stopped us from taking it for a spin already. Read on for our tips on how to play The Crew so you hit the tarmac running come launch day.
Remember The Crew is an MMO
You’ve probably heard the term ‘Persistent World Game’ tossed about recently. Destiny, The Crew and the upcoming Tom Clancy’s: The Division have been tagged as such, but make no mistake: The Crew is an MMO (massively multiplayer online game). This means it’s all about leveling up, unlocking mods and accumulating both mods and wealth.
Players are rewarded for everything they do in the game – from story-based missions, to co-op quests to dynamic tasks that occur on the fly – and every mod, piece of in-game cash and reputation point they earn in the game can be put to use. The more you play, the more you earn. The Crew wants your life. We suggest you yield accordingly and settle in for long play sessions. Destiny users are averaging more than three hours at a time, and we don’t expect The Crew to demand any less of you.
You think this is co-op? Think again!
A lot of the trailers for The Crew have left players with the impression that the game is largely a co-op experience, with players playing together aiming towards a common goal.
While this is true in Faction Missions (more on those later), for the most part, players are competing against each other within their four-person crew. In races, time trials and attack missions, players earn points by placing high up in the running or causing the most damage to the AI target. It's every man and woman for themselves out there, so bear that in mind before The Crew causes you to fall out with your friends. How much do you trust them?
It’s all about the grind
The more you put into The Crew, the more you will get out. Every single action players take in the game earns them something – be that XP, in-game cash, mods or just a bump on the game’s leaderboards.
Luckily, you won’t have to resort to Destiny’s tedious loot caves to get ahead. The in-game map in The Crew is bursting with story quests, side missions, co-op races and more. Even driving from one end of the map to the other will likely put players into a ton of dynamic challenges allowing them to unlock vehicle mods as they travel. Don’t fear the grind. Embrace it. You’ll be glad you did.
You get the right car for the right job
Cars are divided up between ‘classes’. Street Spec cars are your standard tarmac-friendly fare. Dirt Spec cars are best for off-road racing. Perf Spec are supercars – Lamborghinis, Ferraris, Aston Martins and the like. Circuit Spec cars hug the road like it’s a lover and navigating corners involves braking late and braking hard. Raid vehicles are the monsters of The Crew; they’re big beasts, fitted with roll bars, confrontational grills and monster-truck tyres.
For the most part, The Crew will select the class of car you need for the mission you’re attempting for you. You’ll never be hamstrung in story mode by being saddled with a car that gives you no chance of winning. However, once you jump into creator-based missions that safety net may evaporate. Remember: mode early and mod well.
All of these car types can be modded – and, if you care, the modifications have even been cleared with the real-world manufacturers – but you will never end up in a race with a car that’s incapable of allowing you to win. At least not in story missions.
The Crew takes time
It isn’t just the map or the amount of missions that are gargantuan. The length of missions in the game can peel years off your life. Some missions, such as point to point track races can take minutes. Attack missions such as the one we played in which we had to smash up a prison bus while hurtling through the storm drains of Los Angeles, can take around half an hour. Cross country hill climbs and off-road races – can take the better part of an hour to get through. The longest mission in the game, so the developers tell us, takes four whole hours to get through so it might be worth visiting the loo and turning off your phone before you attempt it.
It’s worth using the app
Players who commit to the grind are likely to open up a ton of car parts, skins and mods, but finding the right combination for each of their cars in the HQ can be more than a little time consuming.
However, The Crew mobile phone app allows them to access their fleet of cars without having to boot up the main game and they can tinker with their cars until their heart's content. Why waste your own time when you can waste your boss's?
Faction wars mean big rewards
Ivory Tower plans to throw out a series of Faction War missions every month. This gives players a chance to team up with friends, in true co-op fashion, and compete against other Factions for XP, cash, reputation and exclusive and unique mods. At the end of a set period of time, the Faction at the top of the leaderboard gets a cache of mods putting them ahead of their rivals and then the next round of warring begins. Those who take part and do well will be able to trick out their rides faster.
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Creator-based features are locked and loaded
Post launch, the developers want players to invest in The Crew creatively. To that end, they’re going to allow players to set up their own challenges and missions. Right now it’s uncertain as to how much of an editorial role the developers will take – if players decide to create challenges that are nigh on impossible, Ivory Tower may step in. At present, though, they’re relying on the community to regulate itself; if you set up a DualShock-shattering challenge, it’s likely no one will play it anyway.
However, developers are offering an incentive. Players who set up popular challenges and those who rack up the best score on those challenges may be rewarded with prestige in the form of in-game money and XP. So it’s worth getting creative or at least seeking out the creations of others for some easy money.
The Crew releases on Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4 and PC on December 2. For more information visit http://thecrew-game.ubi.com/portal/en-gb/home
