Sleeping Dogs, Spiritual Successor To True Crime, Launches In August

A long time ago in the far off year of 2009, Activision announced a new game in the True Crime franchise. It was to be called True Crime: Hong Kong and feature a story of a cop going undercover into t...
Sleeping Dogs, Spiritual Successor To True Crime, Launches In August
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  • A long time ago in the far off year of 2009, Activision announced a new game in the True Crime franchise. It was to be called True Crime: Hong Kong and feature a story of a cop going undercover into the seedy world of the Triads. It was never meant to be, however, since Activision canceled the game in 2011. Shortly after, Square Enix picked up the game, renamed it Sleeping Dogs and now it’s finally seeing the light of day.

    Square Enix announced today that Sleeping Dogs will be launching in the U.S. on August 14 for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360. The game is a “gritty open world cop drama set in the vibrant city of Hong Kong.” While the game will be following the precedent set by previous open world games, it does have a few things that sets it apart. For one, it features a fully integrated melee combat system for players to use martial arts moves on enemies. Here’s my favorite part of the description:

    “Players perform bone-crushing kicks and combos, vicious counters, and a cinematic set of environmental takedowns making use of countless real-world items from circular saws to phone booths, incinerators to refrigerator doors.”

    If that doesn’t make you excited, you obviously don’t like environmentally influenced violence. Very few melee focused combat games let the player take advantage of the environment around them, so it’s always a delight to see a game that does.

    While the games doesn’t come out until August, there’s always an incentive to pre-order and Square Enix is splitting it up across the same three retailers as Resident Evil 6. You will be able to pre-order the game from Best Buy, GameStop and Amazon for three different in-game DLC packs.

    The Best Buy DLC is called the Georges St. Pierre pack and features the following:

    GSP’s signature “flying punch”
    Exclusive GSP outfit including T-shirts, headband and shorts
    GSP’s outfit unlocks the “flying punch” and increases grappling and throwing damage

    GameStop gets the Police Protection Pack which includes the following:

    Exclusive “High Speed” Mission
    Exclusive HK Police SWAT Outfit
    Exclusive assault rifle
    Exclusive SWAT Police Vehicle

    Finally, Amazon gets the following items in the Martial Arts Pack:

    Shaolin Showdown Mission
    Shaolin Warrior outfit (with increased striking damage)
    Bonus Triad XP points
    Wing Chun decoration for safehouse (with temporary combat buff)

    The digitally downloadable PC version will also get some form of exclusive content. Square Enix is staying mum for now, but they will announce these details at a later date.

    With Grand Theft Auto V possibly launching this year, I don’t know if people have it in them to play another open world crime game. If you are itching for some underground criminal syndicate action, however, check out the trailer for Sleeping Dogs to see if it does it for you.

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