Watch_Dogs

When I first saw this game on the E3 gameplay footage, I was so amazed by the graphics, the gameplay also looks fresh, ok it's basically a third person shooter action game with hacking bits, but the hacking bits feel innovative, I've never seen that in a game before, being able to utilize the city as your weapon and every single NPC now has their own identity, we've never had that in an open world game. This game right here is brimming with potential, I know many also find that something fresh and looks like the true turning point from the current-gen to next-gen (or you wanna call it last-gen to current-gen now) that's why the game was over-hyped, thinking it's gonna be a great game, a whole new open world experience looks like you can literally control the city and just freak people out by turning off the lights, tripping car alarms and exploding fuse boxes in their faces, it's true, I find the game great, it's just not as great as I expected.

This game really depends on the hacking mechanic so much, if you take away Aiden's phone, it's pretty much another average action open-world game. I laugh a lot when I see the enemies freaking out thinking the place is haunted and especially blowing up fuse boxes in their faces, I really love that. The gameplay though, is quite stealth based, while I prefer a loud-and-proud high style action, this is one of the few stealth mechanic I actually enjoy beside Spider-Man Noir from Shattered Dimensions and Hitman Absolution. Strange, I don't enjoy Assassin's Creed much considering Watch Dogs is also from Ubisoft. Gameplay is also up to the player, when entering an enemy base you can get in stealthily, scout the area with the cameras around the base you can hack and take the guards down one by one or just distract everyone, finish the main objective and escape as the Digital Shadow that you are or take out a gun, blaring alarms all around and kill everything in sight Rambo style, I prefer the stealth takedown myself, but some missions demand you to just get past the enemies without any takedowns or alert and it's alright, the amount of these demanding missions isn't crazy or anything, so they all seem like just some additional challenges more than a pain in the ass, I like it when games don't demand so much from the player like we're just following direct instructions and also not leave everything to the player, every game needs a core gameplay players have to follow but nothing too demanding.

The city of Chicago is brimming with side activities and beauty, I really love the cityscape, the people feel so alive, they're not just some people passing by, they have names and dark secrets you can see when profiling them, you can see the people doing interesting stuff, so well animated, playing soccer, getting high, human billboards tossing a sign, rap battling, fighting and other stuff, some people also react when they see you like when you're running, parkouring around like crazy, people comment on what you do, this is also the first time I see the NPCs (Non-Playable Characters) actually react when you're holding a weapon, look at GTA, walking by a police officer with a gun in hand and they're all like meh, unless you aim the gun at them, this is also a problem in Watch_Dogs, when I wanna kill an enemy from behind with a gun, they don't notice you pointing the gun behind them, but somehow pointing a gun at a homeless guy from behind immediately alerts him?! What's all that battle training for, then?! The side activities are quite interesting, hacking an indoor camera and looking at the sick stuff the people are doing, taking down a gang, a criminal convoy, but after a while they just get dull, it's the same thing over and over again, yes, you can approach however you want, but you just lose the kick after a few times, the most interesting one is the random crime, usually seen in dark alleys, a guy's going to mug someone and then you jump in and catch the criminal red-handed, ideally if the victim doesn't get hurt, it's bleeding annoying how you see the guy pulling out his gun but you approach them a split second before the alert shows up and the would-be criminal and victim just walk away together like you just messed up a badly made reality TV show. There are AR phone games about shooting aliens and collecting coins, they're just meh, chess puzzles that make you feel smart, no seriously, I know jack about chess and I finished all the puzzles, just to get the upgrade reward and then I never feel like touching them anymore, poker game which I never wanna touch except when it's part of the story and a drinking game. Digital Trips are interesting somewhat especially the Spider Tank while everything else feel meh, tried them once and then never gonna be touched again.

The skill trees are pretty great, some of them are quite pointless like the hacking upgrade so you can gain more money from hacking bank accounts, driving upgrades are so unnoticable, the combat and crafting upgrades are useful, and the hacking upgrade lets you hack more city infrastructure like raise road blockers, overload steam pipes, raise bridges and some other stuff, the hack ability to disable helicopter is useful, if the camera were a bit nicer, this ability would be useful when you're in a vehicle but the camera's vertical movement is limited when in a vehicle, so I have to get out of the car, police cars all around, move the camera upward and disable the damn thing (kinda reminds me of when I need to change the battery for my AC remote) while all the other enemies must've already shot Aiden dead because he has the durability of a cracker, the armor upgrade doesn't help much either.

STORY SPOILER ALERT!!
The story kinda reminds me of Spider-Man a little bit, basically because Aiden hacks into a criminal mastermind only trying to hack the bank account but the mastermind thinks Aiden's trying to steal an important file which is only a massive case of misunderstanding, he was targeted but his niece died instead, now for feeling guilty for causing her death, Aiden becomes a masked vigilante who fights crime if he feels like it, it's ironic how you can hack a random bypasser's bank account while chasing a small-time mugger or create a massive car accident just to take down a bunch of gang members chasing you, Aiden can't be called a hero, he's just someone looking for vengeance, Aiden's character just isn't interesting, he's a bit of a douchebag and that's actually what I like about his character, appearance-wise I love Aiden's looks, I just really like the billowing trenchcoat style. Clara looks like an independent female character at first, but in the end she just seems like another damsel in distress, thank you for not making any cliche romantic moments. I'm also not sure what kind of relationship they're trying to build between Aiden and Clara, at first I thought they're aiming for friendly rivalry, then, they only seem like partners, and then Aiden seems a bit like a father figure and I sense a bit of love interest before the writers clearly say "NOPE!". By far, the most interesting character is Jordi Chin, a fixer hired by Aiden who doesn't appear much in the game, but when he does, I really love his character, he's a funny smart-mouthed character, a really fitting character for a main character in my book, and as only a fixer for hire, I'm pretty sure you know stuff is gonna happen. You know, the B word.
SPOILER ENDS HERE!!

Soundtrack for Watch_Dogs is quite impressive, I love the in-game background music, like during sneaking, chases and gunfights, they really suit the moment, the track list though are a but dull, yes I do like some of them but mostly also the bits of the background music.

Watch_Dogs is a great game, I'll say that. It brings something innovative to the table, but it just feels like a new kind of cherry on top a regular ice cream, it's brimming with potential but falls flat in the story and gameplay variety department, the cityscape is beautiful, people feel alive, the characters are all so well voice acted, character animations also looks stunning.