Sleeping Dogs Review

Posted By Robert G. about 10 months ago

Sleeping Dogs Review

It is funny how this industry works sometimes. The myriad of dropped IPs and cancelled projects the industry goes through each year is staggering, and considering only 10% of games released actually turn a profit, it is no wonder that projects are dropped on a dime. Through this all, success stories do come through, venerated by fans and critics alike for persevering such dour times to see the light of day once more.

In many ways, Sleeping Dogs is one such title. Originally an Activision IP under the True Crime label, the game was dropped by the huge conglomerate because it was “just not good enough” to compete with other titles in the open-world genre. But considering the final product put forth by Square-Enix and developer United Front, I believe I can safely say that it is a severe miscalculation by Activision, as Sleeping Dogs is perhaps one of the best in the genre to come out in years.

A bold claim, of course, but a justifiable one. Unlike the satirical-realism of Grand Theft Auto, the nostalgic take from L.A Noire, or the bombastic romp that is Saints Row, Sleeping Dogs is tightly rooted in reality moreso than its competitors. Of course artistic license is given to some elements, but the source material takes the world seriously, leading to an experience that Grand Theft Auto IV attempted to capture but failed to do so.

Starring as undercover cop Wei Shen, Sleeping Dogs has you infiltrate the Song On Yee, a notorious Triad gang in Hong Kong. Shen, growing up in the states, returns to take down the Triad’s from the inside out, but also has a personal stake in his mission, one that may cross the line and put him on the wrong side of the law. The story is one part The Departed and one part Hard Boiled, and creates a tone that is both glamorizing and gruesome for Shen as he struggles to stay on the right side of the law.

But beneath the gritty exterior and the abundance of violence, the core themes of a heroic bloodshed story germinate to fruition. Traditional Chinese themes of honor, family, and respect are always ever present, from the somber monologues of your new criminal family, to the more subtle nuances regarding the treatment of characters based on their age and position in society. It is a clash of two worlds, the Confucian ideals of China intermixed with the modern concerns of the West, offering a layer of cultural diffusion that was only truly noticeable in Red Dead Redemption before.

Punching and kicking combos become almost second nature as you dodge and duck your way through vicious altercations.

Through gameplay, Sleeping Dogs is an amalgam of several elements rolled into a fine product. Unlike say Dragon’s Dogma, which emulated many games but failed to make the mechanics properly mesh, Sleeping Dogs does so seamlessly in some respects, making the transitions of mechanics fun. Hand to hand combat, for example, follows a similar counter/attack combo system found in Batman: Arkham City, giving Sleeping Dogs free-flowing combat that accurately follows typical Wuxia tropes. Driving follows the standards from the aforementioned GTA, but with added bits to make it more exciting, such as “action hijackings”, where you can jump onto the top of a the roof of a car during a high-speed chase. We also have a simple use of quick time events, typically trying to smooth talk your way past a guarded position or countering a bear hug by a thug.

The only real sore spot would be the shooting mechanics, which work but are imprecise. Unlike the fluid, total control of the martial arts and the combos you have through hand to hand combat, using guns is somewhat hit or miss, and highly dependent on how strong you are at hand-eye coordination over blind firing. Ironically taking cues from Stranglehold, gun combat is one of the few instances where we get an automatic “bullet time” moment, mostly when you are driving or sliding over chest high walls, making this your best bet to take down enemies before they fill you full of lead. The drawbacks is that just hiding under cover like a third person shooter will often lead to a death sentence, as ammo is limited and picking up new weapons is not an automatic action.

Sleeping Dogs Review

By Robert G.

There is no doubt in my mind that the former Activision title is on par with, if not surpassing, the likes of Rockstar’s rogues gallery of sandbox adventures. Make no mistake, Square-Enix has a success story on hand, and will reap the benefits from Activision’s mistake to let this sleeping dog lie.

Sage Reviews: Sleeping Dogs

By Bennett The Sage

It's the best kind of good: surprisingly good.