Code 3: Police Response

As a LEO I want to support this, but it just seems like a unity asset flip

I hate cops My time with the game if you're interested: https://youtu.be/T9bxkOXsl2c

Ok, so I finally bought this game after a very, VERY long time of contemplating over it, mainly due to the negative reviews left on Steam giving me a poor first impression. Honestly though, I'm really glad that I did buy it, and I'm going to give my genuinely honest opinion as to why I have enjoyed this game and feel it's an investment to get it now. (I'll mention now, I'm not an LEO, nor a law enforcement expert. I'm also not a game developer, so I won't be talking in technical terms about much at all). Firstly, I'll talk about the market. If you're going to enjoy this game, you need to enjoy its themes. It's very different to games such as Ready or Not I believe. This is because it is structured differently to them. Other games in the Tactical FPS genre are easily 'pick up and play' types of things, whereby you can get really good at them, but you don't need to consider things such as Use of Force or deescalation (and yes, I honestly feel this way even with Ready or Not). That doesn't necessarily mean that this game isn't appealing to a wider market, but I feel that the people who will get the most out of it are people interested in Law Enforcement and the intricacies involved in it, primarily due to the interesting scoring system that assesses every single detail of what you do, right down to the amount of shots you fire (so when I magdump suspects I do get penalised for this - such a shame!) Secondly, graphics. This game is an early access indie game being built by a small team, so I understand that the graphics won't be immensely next-gen. I am happy with the current graphics, but do hope that the team will continue to work on improving these, as if the game was released with these graphics and I bought it for full price I wouldn't be satisfied with it. Some things that I feel need to be worked on are blood/gore sfx (which, at present, look like paint splashes and are minimalistic at best), character models, weather and lighting. Next is general gameplay. Here I'm talking about the fun stuff, gunfights, investigations, interactions etc. I feel that, at present, this stuff is at a 6/10. The gunfights are enjoyable, but are hindered by other aspects (which will be discussed later). When it comes to the less lethal (see what I did there!) stuff, this is where the game falls down. The communication with suspects on all callouts that I have played do not really bring much to the overall outcome. I've tried hard to de-escalate every situation, and none have been successful. There's 2 possible explanations for this, either I'm not good at de-escalating a situation (to which I need to throw my dream of being a crisis negotiator out of the window!) or the communication element needs to have a balance of probabilities worked on, whereby good communication can actually de-escalate suspects. I think this would greatly enhance the game, but I also do understand that it is designed for entertainment, and for many this isn't an entertaining feature. Also, with less lethal weapons, in the rare occasions that you are able to deploy them, they don't necessarily feel very effective. Call me a psychopath (I'm not, I swear) but when I Taser someone I want them to look as if they've been Tasered, and right now it just doesn't seem like that's the case. I hope this is worked on in the course of development! Next up is Suspect AI, which I feel is where the game struggles. I've heard AI is difficult to work with, and if so I commend what they've done at present, but there is definitely room for improvement. Suspect AI often resorts to shooting at the Officer no matter where they are. They never care for the well-being of members of the public and will just, in the wise, wise words of one Frank Reynolds, 'start[ed] blasting'. Now sure, these suspects are criminals, but there is a certain honour among thieves where I feel that the patrons to their 'Antiques Shop' won't be too pleased about getting shot by their hosts, for example. On the flipside, however, there are callouts where the whole point of it is to stop an active shooter, and in these situations it seems that the suspects don't go after civilians at all. If they're able to be programmed to target ANYONE in these callouts, I think that'd be great. Furthermore, suspect tactics would be great, such as not automatically rushing towards Officers, and instead taking cover, using cover fire etc. When it comes to Partner AI, there is also work to be done. Sometimes I wonder who did his Academy Training, but whoever it was, they deserve firing at times. Sometimes, he can be brilliant, providing cover fire with pretty good accuracy (sometimes TOO good), but other times he just goes a bit too... trigger happy. For example, some geezer started punching me whilst at the Jail (which I consider incredibly rude considering I'd just released him from his cell) Any ordinary Officer would whip out their baton, or maybe a Taser, and the bloke would soon calm down after being smacked with a metal pole or having 50,000 volts of electricity course through his body, but no! Officer Bob (other name suggestions for the AI partner are welcome) decided that lethal force was necessary, and promptly shot him 5 times in the head with an AR-15. Classy. On a serious note, however, this does need editing, because I thought that this would be a perfect time to deploy less lethal tactics, and this opportunity was snatched from me. Now for some miscellaneous positives, and let me start with the dispatch system. I love it. The realistic callouts and radio transmissions really add to the immersion of the situations. Next is the variety of missions, there's loads of callouts already in the game with a variety of maps and backstories. My personal favourite is the 'Antiques Shop' that I mentioned earlier, but on a realism basis I'm a huge fan of the Residential Domestic Dispute. I'll say no more, as I wish not to spoil anything. Finally, and most randomly, I really like the sound of the Glock. I don't necessarily know why, I just do. And to conclude, I am really happy with this purchase, although I am worried that we may have seen the end. The game hasn't been updated for 4 months now, and the forums and social media channels are scarily quiet. I really hope that the developers are just taking a break after the early access release and that we haven't seen the end of such a promising project. That's all I have to say, I hope that, if you have read this, it's helped you make up your mind. I spent long enough on it! But in all seriousness, this is a brilliant game and a great investment provided the development team are still working on it and we haven't seen the end of it. I'd say give it a chance. 15 (insert your local currency here) is, I feel, a very fair price for this game. I hope to see more of it soon. And to the Developers, thank you for bringing us a very enjoyable game. I hope to see more of it in due course.