The Crew 2: Review

           The Crew 2 is a game developed by Ivory Tower and published by Ubisoft, and is a successor to The Crew. The Crew 2 Gold Edition was released on June 26th, and the Standard Edition on the 29th. Players of The Crew thought that the game would move on from the United States for the second title in the series, but it turns out that The Crew 2 kept the same general map, but improved the physics and graphics. While that might have turned away a number of fans, the amount of new features kept them playing. The Crew: Wild Run Expansion brought monster trucks and drag racing, and they were added into the base game of The Crew 2. The main new feature is the addition of planes and boats, which made the game feel different compared to other generic racing games.
           This review is broken up into different sections.

The Map

           While the map is similar to the first game, it is way different. The addition of boats gave the map more rivers and streams throughout the map. The biggest worry for players with the boats was that there was going to be no where to use them, but as it turns out, there are plenty of bodies of water to drive them through.

           The map is full of diversity. The biomes are evenly spread out and the transitions between them are subtle. Many iconic locations of the United States are included across the map. The Statue of Liberty, Golden Gate Bridge, and many more are in their correct locations. 

           Of course with any freeroam game with a map this big, there are easter eggs scattered throughout. Area 51 is included, buildings shaped like Pacman and other famous characters, and a poor guy stranded on an island off of the coast.

           The map covers thousands of square miles and fast traveling is your best friend in this game, but for the people that want to take it slow and drive around, the United States is your playground. There are tons of areas to explore across the map.

           With a map this big there are going to be issues and bugs, but in The Crew 2, I haven't experienced many. The problem with the map being so large is that the game takes nearly 5 minutes to load up on Xbox One. 

The Storyline

           The story for the game is basically nonexistent, it's more just complete race after race until you beat the bosses, and then you're done. The voices for the characters are irritating and they have random dialogues in the middle of racing, and it's lazily done. 

           For the characters, the lips never move the way they should. It seems like the cutscenes were animated before having the dialogues. The story is the main drawback for the game, if I'm honest.

           The artsy cutscenes that usually talk about the history of a car look amazing, except a lot of people skip them. They don't make up for the dialogues, but they're still awesome.

The Gameplay

           The games physics definitely improved a lot, especially compared to The Crew, it isn't at the level of Forza games, but maybe eventually it'll make it there. The boats handle fairly well, and the planes handle amazingly. The only game to compare them to is Grand Theft Auto Five, but in the planes you can airdrift, loop, barrel roll, and they give you much more freedom than the boats and cars.

           One of the best gameplay features is the ability to switch vehicles in seconds, there is no loading screen. You could be flying over New York City and decide, "I would rather drive" and you can switch without stopping. It is so satisfying to take a jump and time the switch into a boat perfectly and drive away in the boat. 

           The Crew 2 has a wide variety of views to choose from while driving. The dynamic weather system is not quite perfected, but it exists. All cars can drive in automatic and manual transmissions. The camera mode has an incredible amount of features. You can remove the other cars, change the weather, time of day, even the amount of dirt your car has. 

           Here's the thing about this game, it has everything, but it hasn't perfected any of them, but they do put games of all categories to competition. It challenges Forza Horizon 3 and Need for Speed: Payback's driving physics, Grand Theft Auto 5 is now no longer the only game to have planes, boat and cars, and challenges map sizes of all other freeroam games. The music in this game also easily beats just about every other game with its wide variety of genres and number of songs.

Vehicles and Customization

           When you start The Crew 2 you automatically gain access to a house in South Miami, and Season Pass owners get a house North of Los Angeles. The houses store your bikes, boats, planes, and cars. As you progress through the game, your house gets better lighting and renovated. 

           The house is also the place where painting, and visual and performance upgrades happen. Older cars tend to have more customization, and the boats, planes, and newer cars have less customization options. Most of the customization options look great, except for the rims. Most of the rims are unpleasant to look at, and there aren't well known branded rims like BBS or ADV. However, The Crew 2 allows you to choose from manufacturer rims, like in real life. 

           Performance upgrades can't be bought in The Crew 2. Instead, they are found in crates across the map, or given to you after completing a race. 

           In total there are 114 cars in The Crew 2, excluding the 2 that came out a few days ago. That may sound like a lot, but games like Forza have hundreds. While playing, 114 cars is definitely enough because it takes an extremely long time to get money in the game. The cars are evenly spread out between the disciplines in the game. The pause menu to change cars is frustrating, you can't change the sort order of your vehicles. 

Overall Assessment

           The Crew 2 is an enjoyable sequel to The Crew. There's no other game that allows you to switch between planes, boats, and cars in seconds while exploring the United States. If you aren't worrying about the campaign and just want a game to mess around with your friends in, this is one of the best to do so. Here is an overall assessment of the game:

Good

• A huge, diverse map to explore
• A wide selection of vehicles
• The ability to switch between vehicles in seconds
• Music selection
• Unique races
• Improved physics

Bad

• Lack of licensed rims and bodykits
• Time to load up
• Uninteresting story
• Inconvenient pause menu
• Inconsistent prices
• Lack of difficulty settings/Extreme AI rubberbanding

          What do you rate The Crew 2? Tell us below or on Twitter!