Crackdown 3
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Rating Summary
Based on 112 critic reviews
OpenCritic Rating
Top Critic Average
Critics Recommend
Score Distribution
Unscored Reviews
Top Critic
One of the great open-world templates fails to come into focus in this well-meaning, if embattled, sequel.
I don’t hate Crackdown 3, and that’s because I knew exactly what it was I was getting into and wanted that very thing. While the original Crackdown games don’t rate so highly with most, I had a real blast with them for the stupid fun they offered, and Crackdown 3 was the same for me. It certainly helped that it was short because if I had to deal with the game’s many problems for long, I’d be singing a different tune. And those problems that are present could be enough to put off anyone not familiar with the series that wants to try. The design is underdone and the gameplay exceedingly simplistic and unchallenging, with a co-op mode fraught with technical issues and a couple of PvP modes not worth a damn. The good news is that a sequel, or maybe a significant update, is absolutely set up by the ending, which means that Microsoft must be planning on keeping the series around. It absolutely has the potential, and under Microsoft’s new “Initiative” program, I reckon Crackdown could be something really great. Right now, it’s just really alright.
Crackdown 3 does not innovate the genre. It is extremely similar to the first game, which is a shame in some aspects. I was hoping the extra development time would give us some interesting twists to the franchise, but it didn’t besides destructible environments. Despite the similarities, it is still fun to play! It’s one of those games that I can pick up, play for a few hours, and leave with a smile on my face. And in the end, that is all that matters to me. If you enjoy it, great. If you don’t, it’s ok to let others enjoy it. If you have Xbox Game Pass, then it is definitely worth a try.
Crackdown 3 feels like a dated open-world game with little depth beyond its zippy traversal mechanics. It’s slick visuals and fun platforming moments mask repetitive combat and a severe lack of Terry Crews beyond the opening cinematic.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a flawed experience but dispite that, it can still offer several moments of fun.
Review in Greek | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a playpen of combat and destruction that sets itself up as a liberating journey into a barbarous fantasy of wanton mayhem. But its central proposition — the freedom to do as I please — is undermined by frustrating design compromises.
Top Critic
All things considered, Crackdown 3 being this enjoyable represents a minor miracle, and I’d love to see what these teams are capable of with the franchise without being dicked around by corporate for half a decade.
Top Critic
It reeks of development hell, as demoralising to play as I imagine it was to make. Yes, clearing a map of its icons can be readily distracting, and it fulfils this role at least.
Top Critic
There are better ways to get your superhero action fix, but there are worse ones, too. Crackdown 3 is at least worth a try.
Scored Reviews
Top Critic
Forget Crackdown 2 ever happened, Crackdown 3 is the sequel we deserve. It takes everything that made the original game so great and expands upon it, leveraging the power of the Xbox One to make the experience bigger and better.
Top Critic
‘Crackdown 3' is everything you'd expect in a sequel. New location, new guns, new abilities, and a few hidden surprises along the way to keep you on your toes.
Long-suffering Crackdown fans finally have a worthy sequel. The campaign was every bit as campy and fun as expected, with Terry Crews a perfect addition to the cast, and the multiplayer proving to be surprisingly entertaining.
Kills for skills makes a grand return, and Crackdown 3 is the sequel fans have been waiting patiently for since the original launched.
Despite the setbacks and delays, Crackdown 3 has put the franchise firmly back on solid ground and that is mostly because of the exceptional work and dedication of developers Sumo Digital. They have not only addressed all of the shortcomings of Crackdown 2 but they have improved upon the core gameplay and the experience itself. Crackdown’s future is so bright the cigar chomping, slave driving, blow hard, sour puss of an Agency Director would be cracking a smile if he could. Good things come to those who wait and Crackdown fans have certainly had to do that.
Crackdown 3 revels in fuelling its superhero power fantasy with a fantastic open world to explore and destroy
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 makes no sense on paper. Its story is nonsense, you spend way too much time searching for hidden orbs and leveling up, and the presentation isn't anything spectacular. And yet, the over-the-top madness and hilarious, memorable moments it brought me made it impossible to put down. While the PvP multiplayer mode falls short of what it's trying to achieve, there's a lot to love about Crackdown's long overdue return.
Top Critic
It mantains everything that created a really enjoyable franchise: non-stop action and an enormously satisfying progression system. It's not a game changer and you won't be surprised by its graphics, but it will offer you some toooooasty action.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Top Critic
Despite some flaws in terms of story and UI, Crackdown 3 is a decent sequel of the series.
Review in Chinese | Read full review
My review of Crackdown 3 started with a negative, however much like the game, the further you get into it, the more you’ll begin to understand the point. Crackdown 3 may not be the prettiest game in the world, but the longer I’ve spent with it, the more I’ve come to love it.
A really fun game but needed a little more variety
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 won’t blow you away with its graphics and the story isn’t heartbreaking and memorable - but it’s fun... lots and lots of cathartic, explosive fun.
Overall, Crackdown 3 is some good ol’ over the top fun. The simple formula of go there, do this, take out these enemies, free these people, does work but can get a little repetitive. But the liveliness of the world will keep you entertained.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a weird one to review, because it feels distinctly out of date. The delays and changes in direction have resulted in a modern game with design sensibilities that feel over a decade old, but they hold up incredibly well. While not a long campaign, the time I spent with Crackdown 3 was a lot of fun, and recommended to fans of the original. Just make sure to play as Terry Crews to improve the experience.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a refined improvement over the previous two instalments. The single and co-op campaign modes are super fun, and the jumping and combat systems give our character a real feeling of power and invincibility which transfers well to the player. Visually appealing, fast-paced and tons of missions to complete, I would recommend this game to anyone, not just fans of third-person action games. While not revolutionary, it is still a great example of its genre.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is exactly what I wanted. That is most glowing praise I can give it.
Top Critic
Loud, brash and gleefully addictive at times, Crackdown 3 is unashamedly fun, even if it does feel more like a remake than a sequel.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 comes directly from the past, from an era in which the open-world action games focused mainly on the amount of things to do, to the detriment of the overall quality and variety of situations. This does not mean that the formula proposed by Sumo Digital doesn't work, far from it, but it's linked to a now anachronistic concept of a genre that has evolved in the last couple of years into something that goes beyond the simple repetition of the same tasks throughout the duration of the campaign.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Overall there is a lot of fun to be had with Crackdown 3 but it is slightly mindless fun and won’t stimulate you a great deal, its just a shame that this has been in development for so long everyone expected more from it, including me, just switch off your brain and enjoy the mindless fun while it lasts because you probably won’t come back to it for a long time.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 maintains some of the series's inconsistencies, but it does more right than it does wrong, and it's a blast to play when everything comes together.
Top Critic
The term 'more of the same' is bandied about a lot in this industry, but when it comes to Crackdown 3, it is absolutely more of the same. With a few tweaks here and there, and a new city, there's no doubting that the gameplay still absolutely holds up. The structure and busywork tasks issues still persist from previous iterations though, which is perhaps the most disappointing aspect. Fun but repetitive best sums up Crackdown 3.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is without a doubt the best Crackdown yet. It successfully builds upon the previous two games to offer an open world experience that, while formulaic, is still incredibly enticing. This is in part due to the very flexible combat system, which offers heaps of different ways to be as destructive as possible. It's structure has been seen before, sure, and as such Crackdown 3 doesn't break ground in many ways, but it's still such an enjoyable experience that I'm not sure it entirely matters.
Top Critic
Ultimately, none of the flaws in Crackdown 3 are deal-breakers but they hold it back from being truly great. If you can look past them, and just enjoy Crackdown 3 for what it is: a game that gives you a wacky toolset to blast enemies away for 10-20 hours or more, then you'll definitely find value and fun here.
Top Critic
Cracking the formula it set out with 12 years ago, Crackdown 3 delivers the solid and structured, though limited, gameplay of gunning down your enemies while leaping across vast distance and heights. Even if nothing especially new has been added to that formula.
Top Critic
There’s a time and place for games like Crackdown 3. It’s not bad by any means, it’s even quantifiably good and enjoyable. However, while games can be lauded for not following trends, there’s a difference between carving your own path and simply not innovating.
Crackdown 3 is a solid entry in the franchise, I was generally whelmed by it.
Top Critic
Despite an average and sometimes problematic gameplay, despite a poor multiplayer mode, Crackdown 3 is a nice open wold game with various activities and a mafia to take down boss after boss.
Review in French | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is just more Crackdown. For some players, that will be enough. But compared to what Crackdown 3 initially promised, what we ended up with seems lacking in depth and destruction. When it's good, like with its boss fights, there's nothing like it. Unfortunately, there's just too much filler, and with its most exciting feature demoted to a fairly minor multiplayer mode, Crackdown 3 just isn't the step forward that it could have been.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 feels like a product of a prior generation. If it had been released in 2014 or 2015, alongside Saints Row IV or inFamous: Second Son, people might have lauded the way it has to smoke out your opponents and praised its many opportunities for destruction.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 isn't an instant hit, but after a slow start it rapidly builds into an action-packed shooter with brilliant character control and movement. While orb collecting is the key for prolonged play, the campaign in Crackdown 3 is always entertaining and visually there's a lot to appreciate if you look at the bigger picture. Crackdown is back. Shame about the multiplayer Wrecking Zone, though.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is far from a bad game but it also isn't necessary in this day and age.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a fun game that copies and improves what previous iterations of the franchise did well... But not much else, giving us an uninteresting story and a subpar variety on its campaign. And for the multiplayer part of the game: you just can forget it by now. Simply forgettable.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
The game is not just about Terry Crews as Agent Jaxon. Instead it is about a select elite group of agents trying to free the world from a mastermind corporate psychopath who wants to enslave humanity into working for them. TerraNova stops at nothing to dominate this little island and it is your job to take them down anyway you see fit!
Top Critic
Although the game took allot of time to develop unfortunately the final product has not been worthy in the end... I can't hide that I enjoyed the time I spent in the open world of the game, especially climbing buildings and confronting the leaders at the end of each stage, but it is very repetitive in addition to the weird way of driving the vehicle plus the environment of the open world in general is rather boring, it is hard to see an announcement for a new sequel in the upcoming years unfortunately !
Review in Arabic | Read full review
Top Critic
Despite all the promises and the delays, Crackdown 3 is an unexpected miracle. It's genuinely a fun game to pick up and play for a couple of days, but not for longer, as its dated design will turn this experience into a boring and monotonous adventure. Might not be worth the full price, but for members of Xbox Game Pass it's an obligatory stop.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is similar to the film “The Expendables” - a relic from a previous era, simple and straightforward, but still able to entertain.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is not trying to hook you with incredible graphics, interesting story, original quests or unique multiplayer. This project is primarily created for fans of the previous two games, and it's just fun. Exciting progressing system and fun acrobatics with the ability to jump over entire areas in the city are still fascinating, just like in 2007.
Review in Russian | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 as a whole is certainly rough around the edges and more of a mid-tier 1st-party exclusive. There’s some fun to be had, of course. But its overall staying power is a step below other open-world games of its ilk.
A mediocre story and dated mechanics bring this Terry Crews simulator down.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is an old school game that doesn't do anything to sound fresh and new. Sometimes it's fun, but in the long run it's just out of this timeline.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Top Critic
Mechanically solid, but also outdated open-world action game without real highlights.
Review in German | Read full review
Top Critic
Quotation Forthcoming
Review in Italian | Read full review
With it`s weak story, a soulless presentation and repetetive gameplay, Crackdown 3 is a total disappointment after all. The game feels like a Remaster of the first title and continues the series of mediocre exclusives with only few, but outstanding honorable mentions for the Xbox One. Fans of the series should grab the title via Game Pass, everyone else should find plenty of other and better options.
Review in German | Read full review
I don’t hate Crackdown 3. There are certain design flaws in the game and it is clear that perhaps the end product is still not exactly what people were wanting to see. Graphically it is heavily underwhelming, but the gameplay itself is very fluid and the game offers a lot of stuff for you to do, almost too much. This is a game that Crackdown fans will enjoy, but I would say it’s best to either wait for a sale or utilise Gamepass to get the game for at least a month.
Top Critic
Overall, Crackdown 3 feels like an Xbox 360 title running in 4K. In small doses, the action’s a lot of fun. I love jumping around the city and blowing stuff up, but I can’t imagine this is the follow-up fans deserve.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is still a miracle. Not technical. It is a miracle that even after so many problems and such a long development has finally been able to bring a relatively fun action game that fan units can enjoy. I would even say that the game is better than it ever deserve to be.
Review in Slovak | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 sticks to its roots and doesn't innovate much from it. The single-player story mode is fun and engaging despite some dated design but the multiplayer is perhaps the most disappointing aspect of Crackdown 3 that fails to deliver on the expectations set by earlier gameplay demonstrations.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a fun game, but it is also too repetitive to keep you entertained for many hours and its lack of high quality content is obvious. I must say, Due to it's awesome gunplay, destruction system and level design, Crackdown 3 is worth to try for few hours, but it is so far away than what we expected from it.
Review in Persian | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 has more weaknesses than virtues. Its plot is very simple and even becomes predictable. Although it has a good idea in the aesthetic section, it is diminished by the little care that was put into the details. On the other hand, the gameplay of Crackdown 3 is more chaotic and frustrating than it is appreciated in the videos prior to the release of the game. His commands have a strange response and despite having a good sized map, going through it becomes a repetitive activity that takes away much of its brightness. In general, the experience of Crackdown 3 leaves much to be desired, taking into account that this is the first Xbox exclusive in 2019 and that the game was in development for a long time.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a decent sandbox experience that falls short of modern standards, but as an Xbox Game Pass title, it offers some good mindless fun.
Top Critic
The mission structure is repetitive, the story's utter wallop, and the baddies are there for shooting practice. But, damn it, it's fun being an over-powered superhero scaling a building in Crackdown 3.
Top Critic
Competent, with enough fun weapons and silly spectacle to make it inoffensive entertainment. While a half-decade of development hell could've ended with worse results, it's tough to muster much excitement for what's here.
Top Critic
If you've played a Crackdown game before, then you'll know exactly what to expect from Crackdown 3.
Top Critic
This simple action caper where players liberate a neon-clad city from a sinister megacorp makes 15 hours disappear easily
Top Critic
Short and not very good, Crackdown 3 has few things to point to as reasons to exist.
Top Critic
This latest dose of open world superhuman crime fighting action feels like a missed opportunity
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a good Crackdown game, which, unfortunately, doesn't mean much anymore. Modern game design has surpassed the Crackdown model by leaps and bounds -- as high and far as an agent can jump. The most remarkable thing about Crackdown 3 is how unambitious it is. It's content to come off as dated, like a relic from a bygone era. That can be comforting in a way, but it's immeasurably more disappointing. Crackdown 3, just like its kin, is only a distraction and nothing more.
Top Critic
It survived the purge where Fable Legends and Scalebound did not, but even in its best moments, Crackdown 3's campaign feels like it was born too late.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 has had years of build-up and, well, it’s just Crackdown with a tiny bit of new-gen polish. That’s not a bad thing, not by any stretch, but in a February dotted with potentially fantastic releases, it’s going to be an ultimate forgettable one.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is bonkers chaotic fun but also a case of wasted potential. The series deserved an iterative revival but instead, we have the tried-and-tested Crackdown backbone with remastered visuals and a touch more chaos, sadly squandering the promise of its few interesting additions in the process
Top Critic
I did enjoy the mess that is Crackdown 3. In chunks, it can be exciting, but the story, multiplayer, and milquetoast character progression inhibit the Crackdown 3.The promised mayhem is here. But it isn’t more.
Top Critic
Sumo Digital have finally delivered Crackdown 3 after five years, but it feels like a product of a bygone era.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3's campaign is like a thawed-out relic from more than a decade ago. Multiplayer's environmental destruction is interesting in concept, but its bare-bones nature keeps it from being more than a curiosity
Top Critic
Repetitive and middling, Crackdown 3 is a totally average open-world game that doesn't give itself a way to stand out.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 offers occasional glimpses of fun, but it's far too bogged down by outdated mechanics, bugs, and disappointing multiplayer to be worth anywhere near the full asking price.
Top Critic
Though there are moments here that'll bring a smile to your face, Crackdown 3 is crammed with ideas and game design choices that were done better over a decade ago. Just play the original game and wash your hands of this version.
Top Critic
Sadly, few locations in Crackdown 3 fit this profile.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is stuck in an earlier era and offers nothing new to the Open World Games, or even to its own chain.
Review in Arabic | Read full review
Against all expectations, Crackdown 3 managed to survive where others from that same E3 2014 show like Scalebound and Phantom Dust failed to see the light of day, but what we got was just a shinier version of a 2007 game.
Sumo Digital's "Crackdown 3" offers an extremely explosive gameplay experience with no doubt. However, the game leaves a lot to desire on many fronts, and this is the reason why.
Top Critic
"It falls flat on just about every aspect, making us wonder why Microsoft even delayed it for this long, anyway"
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 does its best to ride on an action-packed wave of nostalgia, but in the end all it succeeds in doing is face-planting straight into a morass of tedium and frustration. Even the most stalwart Crackdown fans will likely wonder if the long wait was worth the final result.
Unfortunately, gamers have moved on. Crackdown 3 hasn't.
Top Critic
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is forgettable, broken in places, extremely short and set in its ways. Still, I'd be lying if I told you I didn't have a hell of a lot of fun playing it.
Considering how short-lived both the campaign and multiplayer modes are, it’s astonishing this sequel took this long to come out. If you are a fan of the franchise, you’d find things to love here. Even then, it feels too little too late.
Crackdown 3 is a mindless collectathon that may tickle the right spot for fans of the franchise or those seeking a game stripped of everything but side-missions; those seeking a Terry Crews simulator, like I was, will be left sorely disappointed.
Top Critic
Sumo Digital's Crackdown 3 releases on Xbox One and PC on February 15.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 has finally arrived and instead of being a next-gen iteration of the franchise, it feels like a lost relic of the Xbox 360 era.
Top Critic
An unlucky product, born under a bad star, passed from hand to hand without anyone being able to fix it. A pity, but now that all the fears have been confirmed, we can at least look further.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is fun to play and requires very little in terms of concentration to perform well, but at the same time, it's fairly limited in scope and most players won't find enough on offer to keep coming back.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3's campaign is short on new ideas and relies too heavily on its core loop of collecting orbs and throwing heavy objects around.
Top Critic
The most damning thing I can say is I felt like Crackdown 3 knew I didn’t care about what I was doing—and never went out its way to even try pulling me back in.
Top Critic
When it comes right down to it, everything in Crackdown 3 is by-the-numbers game design, and the end result is not more than the sum of its parts. There are hints of good ideas in Crackdown 3, but the end product isn't worth the $60 purchase. Unless you're getting it free with your Game Pass subscription, you're better off downloading the original game (currently free for all) and playing that instead.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3's mediocre, collectible-heavy campaign and poor Wrecking Zone multiplayer are rarely satisfying busywork.
Going up against some stiff competition in the sandbox arena, the destructive power and nostalgia that come with Crackdown 3 doesn't do enough to make it stand out, or even stand up, to the competitors. Even though they took some time to make sure we get it, the cracks are too evident in its foundation and it makes us wish they cracked down on these imperfections.
Top Critic
Lazy mission design and squandered use of star Terry Crews keeps Crackdown 3 from doing much more than satisfying our urge to smash stuff
Considering the long time Crackdown 3 spent in development purgatory, it's not as bad as it could have been.
A game of checklists that promise little excitement, Crackdown 3 is more of the same, but just not good enough.
It feels as satisfying as ever to drive and general improvements to the original’s underwhelming quantity of content make for a very solid experience to delve into.
No matter how you look at Crackdown 3, you'll only see a generic title that doesn't even have the slightest chance of succeeding. In the era of the great open world titles like Grand Theft Auto V or Saints Row, it really won't stand a chance.
Review in Czech | Read full review
An exercise in mediocrity that would have flown under the radar were it not for the ludicrous development cycle and marketing.
Top Critic
If you liked the original Crackdown and want basically more of that, then you've found your game. If you want a modern first party AAA game, look elsewhere
Top Critic
A tragic end to Crackdown 3's long and painful journey, with an unremarkable campaign mode and a multiplayer that is a disaster in terms of tech and design.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 feels too similar to the game that came before it; it's like Sumo has made Crackdown 2 again
Top Critic
Just go play Crackdown 1 again.
Top Critic
Ultimately, time will tell whether Wrecking Zone becomes Crackdown 3’s saving grace. But despite this mode offering some (much welcome) fun, its hard to see why anyone would shell out their hard-earned cash for this
Unlike the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4, the Xbox One doesn't have an acclaimed title that would entice someone the purchase Microsoft's console. When Crackdown 3 was announced many hoped it would become the system seller the Xbox One needed, even those unfamiliar with the franchise were excited for this. After numerous delays Crackdown 3 is finally here and it was not worth the wait. A mediocre campaign stuffed with busy work and a tacked on multiplayer makes Crackdown 3 only worth playing if you own Xbox Game Pass.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 is a 6th or 7th generation title released in 2019, and is weak and shallow in every possible respect. The multiplayer section of the game is the most pointless experience in the video games industry in years and is suffering from a serious lack of content. Crackdown 3 might only be able to entertain fans of the series for maybe a few hours, and nothing more.
Review in Persian | Read full review
Crackdown 3 could have been another proof that Microsoft can do its exclusive titles properly. But what has been released to us is a below average title that has absolutely nothing to offer. Content is boring and multiplayer can be one of the most corrupted part of the game.
Review in Czech | Read full review
Crackdown 3 is boring, lifeless, and generic. How this game survived and Scalebound didn't is a mystery to me.
Top Critic
Crackdown 3 had a troubled development process with numerious delays and almost got cancelled. Passing years and downgraded showcases lowered our expectations but even with that consideration, Crackdown 3 is not an enjoyable experience. It's not fun and it doesn't worth investing time. Therefore, we do not recommend this game at all, expect if you are a die hard Crackdown fan!
Review in Persian | Read full review
Crackdown 3 is a disaster both in presentation and gameplay and fails to move the franchise forward. The game is utterly unsatisfying and lifeless and isn't worth anyone's time.
