The Precinct is an indie game with ambition. Its fictional 1980s setting of Averno City is an enjoyably complex little sandbox, presenting players with an endless supply of procedurally generated crimes that need to be stopped from a top-down perspective, reminiscent of old Grand Theft Auto games.
You play as rookie cop Nick Cordell, who’s surrounded by a cast of endearingly cliche characters, ranging from hardboiled detectives to comically evil criminals. Nick’s on the trail of his father’s killers, you see, but the only way he’s cracking that case is by hitting the streets.
To be clear, you’re not playing The Precinct for its story. Plot points are dished out through static, portrait-driven dialogue scenes, and although the writing’s quite snappy and entertainingly schlocky at times, narrative tension isn’t really what the game’s going for.
The main story plays out in chunks, with new missions unlocking whenever you rack up enough evidence while out on your standard patrols. It’s a decent structure given how dynamic these patrols can be, but the grind for evidence — which drops at random as you complete objectives — does start to feel a bit tedious towards the end of this 10-ish hour campaign.
But as mentioned, the title’s sandbox leanings are at the forefront of the experience. Each in-game day begins with Nick and his beat partner Kelly choosing a patrol route and solving crimes within the area. Again, the crimes themselves are procedurally generated; one minute you’re issuing a parking ticket, the next you’re chasing down armed bank robbers.
The whole system feels impressively alive and fluid. Whether you’re driving down the highway or hoofing it through alleyways, you’ll be alerted to nearby disturbances — and then you’ve got to try and do things by the book.
Picture this: you hit your sirens on someone suspected of speeding. They pull over, you order them out of their car, and run through the usual procedures; a background check on their ID, a breathalyser test. They’re clean and it’s looking like a straightforward fine, but then you ask them to pop their trunk — and guess what? They dive back into their vehicle and bomb off down the road.
A car chase ensues, and after requesting some support — or maybe even a spike strip — the escapee’s ready to call it quits. You slap the cuffs on them, find some narcotics in their trunk, and then work your way through the game’s charges menu. You book ’em for possession of illegal goods, speeding, and, of course, evading arrest.
All of this happens in the space of about two minutes, and that’s what makes The Precinct such a moreish game. Any of the factors we just described can change on the fly — every crime’s totally dynamic, and by paying attention and slapping suspects with the correct charges, you’re awarded additional experience points upon finishing your patrol.
And naturally, callouts don’t always go so smoothly. When firearms are involved, you’re given license to use lethal force, via the title’s twin-stick shooting mechanics. Although we wish that the cover system was a bit more involved — you can only get behind waist-high objects, for some reason — the gunplay is surprisingly tense and deadly, even on the default difficulty setting.
On that note, we should point out just how technical The Precinct feels. Because of its branching crime mechanics, the controls do take a little getting used to. Between remembering different button prompts for certain actions and navigating the various charge-related options via the aforementioned menus, there’s a lot to keep track of.
But once you’ve got the hang of things, the game’s well-balanced mix of fairly standard policework and full-on cop movie action makes for a delightfully fun sandbox. Whenever you leave the station to start your shift, you just never quite know what you’re going to encounter.
As with any sandbox title worth its salt, there’s potential for hilarity on the streets of Averno City. While you’re supposed to try and operate like RoboCop and follow the law to the letter, there will, inevitably, be times when everything goes to sh*t and all you can do is laugh in the face of disaster.
Indeed, NPC AI can be brilliantly reactive, resulting in a kind of domino effect where entire neighbourhoods devolve into chaos. Firefights, for example, can spill out onto highways, where criminals can be mistakenly mowed down by oncoming traffic.
Suddenly, every driver in the vicinity starts to panic, pedestrians are running for dear life from rogue vehicles, and you’ve got no choice but to just watch in awe as cars pile up at the nearest intersection. Your objective’s a total bust — you can’t arrest a road stain — but you can’t possibly be mad about it.
Conclusion
The Precinct is an impressive sandbox romp. Fueled by a dynamic crime system that offers up hours of fun, bite-sized objectives, it’s a very difficult game to put down. Every patrol is different, and although tedium does start to set in as the campaign approaches its conclusion, it’s still easy to appreciate the intricate and tight design of this ode to old cop movies.
