The original Narcs by Midway is a classic arcade favourite of mine, featuring one red and one blue helmeted officers. The aim in this side scrolling shooter was to take care of the streets lowlifes and eventually take on the crime boss Mr Big himself. Well this game is several years old now and although some of the content was perhaps questionable at the time is still worthy of a blast now and then. Fast forward to 2005 and we have a remake, although it bears very little resemblance to the side scrolling original.

Gameplay:

Game play consists of you taking control of two undercover officers, interchanging at various points throughout the story. In a sort of mini GTA type environments you are able to wander at leisure and do the “cop” thing i.e. bust criminals that randomly appear in your vicinity. However there is more to it than that as you are also able to turn to the darker side of being corrupt and start doing some naughty things as well; such as selling drugs, murder and generally being a nuisance to the random pedestrians that litter the levels.

Players can also get into hand to hand situations, flash their badge to stop criminals, chase them across the map or even wrestle them to the ground with some special moves. What is more, players get to shoot guns at anyone that vaguely looks at them funny. Now whilst this might seem like a good idea the bottom line is that you have a rating which determines how good or bad you are. Should your rating drop too low from naughty underhand cop activity then things can go from bad to worse.

Well that’s the basic premise of the game, fulfil a few story based missions or wander around being nice or naughty, the choice is yours. I found the game play to be rather poor and somewhat boring after extended play as things aren’t handled very well at all. The controls are rather fiddly, the aiming makes you feel out of control and character movement is badly executed well. You also have to keep your eyes wide open and on high alert if you wish to make any random street arrests as the criminals seem to blend in rather too well with the regular pedestrians, which ends up making these busts tedious and random.

What is fun for about 5 minutes is collecting loads of drugs from the various criminals you randomly bust and then instead of dropping the evidence back at the police station, taking them yourself. The drugs affect you in different ways (some even helping you out) but are ultimately one huge gaming gimmick. Although I did laugh at the effect of taking LSD which turned people in to giant headed devils.

Graphics:

For an Xbox game the graphics are very poor, offering little detail in the characters or the environments. As mentioned earlier the animations are rather poor as well, making for an unrealistic looking game.

Sound:

The sound is reasonably atmospheric despite some dry performances from the voice over team, including the likes of Michael Madson. Whilst having movie actors come and do the voices, it really doesnt do them much credit if the game isn’t too hot. Other sounds are your basic gaming noises like gunshots, people screaming or repeating phrases that are neither here nor there and the music soundtrack is of the urban variety, which is great if you like that kind of style.

Longevity:

Narcs is a reasonable length game to mess around with although if you are like me then you might end up getting bored if you play for too long a period of time. With its sandbox world and lots of stats to check then possibly you could be playing for as little or as long as you see fit.

Overall:

Narcs is a poor attempt to be controversial from the magazine adverts featuring busty women to the drug taking/selling in the game. However these features are something that are only mildly entertaining for about 5 minutes and then you are simply left with a 3rd person action game that offers minor sandbox game-play elements. It’s a shame the developers went so off the track and didn’t try and recreate the arcade original a little better as in my opinion the 2D classic is more fun than this 3D modern day counterpart. I suggest you rent this if you really feel the need to sell drugs in a game and perhaps take them but the only high you’re really going to get is when you return the game back to the store.