NARC (PS2 Review)

The 1980s. This was the era of the “Me” generation. Yuppies had replaced hippies. Miniskirts were way up and the Saving & Loan corporations were crashing way down. The video game industry had risen from obscurity, collapsed like a house of cards and rose from its own ashes like the legendary phoenix. One giant was reduced to nothing and a new leader took their place. Video arcades were this generation’s version of the pool halls from the 50s. It was there that children and young adults would gather to socialize and relax. Old and new designer drugs were surfacing into the mainstream as being socially acceptable and AIDS became front page news across the land.

 

The political arena was distressed on how to reach the youth of America. Family values seemed to be on a downward spiral with all of these new negative outside influences. Then, from the shadows, their answer to all of life’s problems came like a thief in the night. It was a simple slogan brought down from the mountain by none other than the First Lady herself. These three simple words were to be a rally point for the moral right and a scouring pad for the souls of all young Americans. Three simple words to save us all; “Just Say No!”

Now that the holy words had been found, the problem remained on how to get them to those who most needed them. Television and radio ads were taken out immediately, but they just did not seem to do the trick. The youth needed to get the message on their own level from something that they associated with completely. Arcade games became the bottle for the message. The first of these new fangled creations to have their message broadcast from was a game from Midway called NARC. This seemed to be the perfect melding as the entire game had the characters fighting crime and the flow of illegal substances by attacking and arresting criminals. The game received a great deal of press because of the positive message that it promoted and was well received by gamers across the land because of the excellent gameplay for the time. The co-op side-scrolling action never let up and many a quarter was fed into this beast until Mr. Big was defeated.

Now more than fifteen years later, gamers once again have the opportunity to fight crime and look to bring down the K.R.A.K crime syndicate and Mr. Big. Gone are the days of the 2-D side-scrolling adventure as now we have the chance to try our luck in the third dimension. Does this new rendition of NARC do justice to the original or does it do a poor job of impersonating an officer of the law? That’s what we have come here to find out. Grab yourself a drink, and perhaps a donut or two. It is now time to enter the interrogation room and grill our subject.

NARC puts you into the shoes of two law enforcement officers; Jack Forzenski and Marcus Hill. You begin the game as Jack, once a fine police officer who ended up on the wrong side of the law. During a stint in the narcotics division, Jack became an addict and was forced into a leave of absence to attend a rehab clinic. Now he has cleaned up his act and returned to active duty. However, we are not quite sure that he has kicked the monkey from his back and he must now prove himself worthy in the eyes of his peers.

The other playable character is Marcus Hill, Jack’s former partner. These two did not part on friendly terms as Marcus left his partner out in the cold when he got hooked on drugs and accepted a promotion to the DEA. Fate has brought this former dynamic duo back together again. There is a new drug on the streets called liquid soul and it is up to these two to stop whomever is behind this new party favor. Their leads will take them to two different continents, both as different as they are from each other, as they pursue the K.R.A.K. crime syndicate and look to bring those behind the scenes to justice.

Gameplay for NARC is unlike anything that I have yet experienced on the PS2. Probably the closest thing that one could compare it to would be Rock Star’s 2002 dud State of Emergency (SoE), which in itself is no big surprise as both games were created by VIS Entertainment. However, in their defense, NARC definitely is a step up from their previous attempt. None of the controlled chaos that SoE radiated seems to have made the transition even though you do have the opportunity to run ramshod throughout the environments taking down everyone in your path. Nevertheless, if you expect to move on through the game, you will have to control your rampages and concentrate on the job of protecting and serving the community.

The city environments are full of life with plenty of pedestrian traffic to be found and apprehended. There is some vehicular traffic, along with parked cars scattered throughout the city, although your characters cannot make use of these to cut down on mission times. Everything must be accomplished via the shoe leather express and this can become tedious at times when searching out a specific location. The vehicles do pay some attention to the foot traffic around them, so you usually won’t have to worry about dodging bad guys and the cars at the same time. However, there are those rare opportunities when you will be sent flying through the air by an inattentive motorist. Also, pedestrians have a habit of popping out of thin air and disappear in the same fashion. For a modern-day title, this is simply inexcusable and a sign of sloppy programming.

Since most of the action takes place after the sun has set, you are working in a perpetual nighttime. This does present a visual problem for the gamer as things are often difficult to make out in the gloomy shadows. Unfortunately, the game’s behind the shoulder camera doesn’t help matters much either. When working the claustrophobic alleys, or even getting close to the sides of a building, there are numerous examples when you completely lose sight of everything around you when the camera tries to adjust by slipping backwards inside a building. Furthermore, when you are in hot pursuit, the camera is exceptionally loose and is a chore to keep pointed in the proper direction. Point of View did include a quick correct button to center the camera, but you must bring your character to a complete stop before it will work. This usually results in the person that you were chasing melting into the crowds or ducking out of view down a side street.

Your only choice of the game, besides running around like a savage in the city, is to progress along the missions assigned to you. The style of assignments are various from following an informer and listening in on his conversations with a shotgun microphone to raiding a drug lab and reducing everything inside to tiny bits of rubble. Your character will change automatically whenever the game so requires, so even though there are two playable characters you do not get the opportunity to choose which one to use for a particular mission. Most of the tasks are rather simplistic in nature, but their difficulty is ramped up because of the poor character control or the difficult camera. You do have the opportunity to take on special missions outside of the normal outline of the script. These are not necessary to be completed if you want to run right through the title, but they offer players a break from the script to branch off and stretch their police prowess.

Players do have the opportunity to use a basic HUD (Heads-up Display) to assist you in your crime fighting endeavors. Everything from your badge rating to the addiction, health and super bust meter and what you have equipped is all within a simple glance of the screen. Players also have the mixed blessing of a functioning radar located up in the top right hand corner. I say mixed blessing because it does function exceptionally well whenever you are on a regular mission. But when players are free roaming within the city, it is more confusing than helpful, often highlighting criminals already in custody or misleading you to take down an honest civilian thinking that they are a budding crime lord.

In-between the assigned missions, players can go out on a free-for-all where anyone and everyone can be either victimized or arrested depending on which direction the player wishes to have their gaming experience flow. You can be the straight-as-an-arrow officer of the law or you can go down the dark path where drugs and money rule your every waking moment. I spent quite a few hours just running around the city snatching up criminals and civilians alike to practice my handcuffing ability; however my badge rating never dropped below 70%. There is quite a prolific criminal element within the cities and their percentage over the regular citizens has got to be well over a two-to-one ratio.

Random crimes happen around you all the time. From purse snatchings, to muggings and even drug deals go down right out in the open. It is completely up to the player’s discretion whether these criminals will be left on the streets or fitted with a set of silver bracelets. Nabbing random criminals will net you an addition to your law enforcement rating, as well as turning in the evidence at the police station. Your badge rating is important to keep you in the good eyes of your brothers in blue and it is necessary to maintain certain levels to allow you access to the police station. Whenever you deposit any of the evidence in the police drop box or arrest some of the random criminals, your rating goes in the positive direction. By committing crimes, like taking drugs or killing innocent civilians, you run the risk of demotion of your rank and possibly even being pursued by your fellow officers just like the rest of the city’s criminal element. Nevertheless, none of these actions need to be done to work yourself through the game as long as you don’t go around taste testing all the evidence or ravaging the innocents.

The biggest “hook” of NARC is the drugs available for you to seize or use for your own purposes. Drugs are acquired randomly whenever you arrest a criminal and you have three choices on what to do with them; turn them in to the police inventory, take them for your own pleasure or resell them on the street for some quick cash. There are eight different variations of narcotics from pot, speed, crack and even the fictional liquid soul and each one will have a different effect on the person taking them. If you pop a LSD tablet, all of the civilians change in appearance with the criminals taking on the appearance of Satan and the regular people having the heads of court jesters. Taking a hit of pot will slow the entire world down, however your weapon aiming speed will remain the same. If you take too much of a drug, you run the risk of become addicted and failing one of the many random drug tests that pop up when working on a mission. Although it may be interesting at first to experiment with the various different screen effects that the drugs produce, it quickly becomes old hat and loses its luster quickly.

Even though the streets may be populated with the vilest of humanity, you are not asked to go out and bring them to justice empty handed. Your character has the finest weapons available on the black market from the simple six shooter to the multi-barrel gatling gun. Your standard issue firearms have an unlimited amount of ammo, while the other weapons all need to be replenished be either taking them from criminals or purchasing weapons from one of the various black market vans parked around the city. Aiming your gun is not the simplest thing in the world to do and it is very easy to run through an entire clip of ammo trying to drop a single subject. You do have the option of using the “aim mode” to get a closer view of your target; however your character has the habit of obstructing your view rather than giving you a better visual on the situation. Player controlled characters can crouch behind objects for cover and lean around corners to get off a quick shot, but I’ve had numerous bad experiences where my officer actually moves into the line of fire, instead of remaining stationary, and gets cut down by a hail of bullets before I can get him moved back under cover. 

You also have the opportunity to go at it with a criminal mano-a-mano. By controlling a simplistic button mashing procedure, you can subdue any citizen and eventually slap on the cuffs. Sometimes they might need to be disarmed before you can begin the arrest procedure and you can soften them up with either some well placed blows or by rendering them unconscious by smacking them with the butt of your weapon. However, if you don’t do the proper procedure, they can either harmlessly break free or toss you over their shoulder rendering you incapacitated for a few seconds while they make an escape. Nevertheless, it is rather simple to react to whatever your mark attempts and in no time flat can you lock down entire city blocks of criminals to be picked up by the paddy wagon.

NARC has received a “Mature” rating by the ESRB for all the right reasons. Besides the obvious drug culture hook, pedestrians often rattle off a string of obscenities enough to make the most seasoned construction worker blush in embarrassment. Although I in no way consider myself a prude, it did seem a bit over the top and could have presented some issues if I had young ones running around the house while playing through the game. Nevertheless, I felt that most of the language was forced and was actually unnecessary. Every time one of the people dropped the F-Bomb, which was quite frequently, there was an inward cringe that did not go away over time. Personally I am not a proponent of blatant vulgarity without a specific purpose, like smashing your thumb with a hammer, and really would have liked to have been able to turn off the colorful metaphors in favor of a more wittier verbal repartee from the surrounding cast.

One of the best aspects of the entire game is the audio. The list of voice acting talent is rather impressive and includes Bill Bellamy (Any Given Sunday) playing the part of Marcus Hill and Michael Madsen (Kill Bill Vol 2) putting the words into the mouth of Jack Forenski. The supporting cast also is better than average with Ron Perlman (Blade II) as Captain Kowalski and Michael Wincott (The Crow) having the privilege of being Mr. Big.

Even though the game advertises Pro-Logic II support, it does not carry the usually Dolby trademark anywhere on either the game packaging or in the credits of the instruction guide. The game does push sound through all of the surround sound speakers; however the quality of the result is not as tight as we have come to being used to when Dolby is involved. Nevertheless, unless you have a highly tuned ear, you probably won’t notice a disparaging difference.

The soundtrack is an impressive mix of classic and modern artists. There are hits from the last four decades of music stretching from Curtis Mayfield (Pusherman, Freddie’s Dead) and Lynyrd Skynyrd (That Smell) to DMX (The Professional) and even Cypress Hill (Hits From the Bong). However, just like most things involved with NARC, you have to take the good with the bad. Unlike the radio stations from Grand Theft Auto, NARC has made each subsection of the city prominent with just one song that does not change until you move out from with the radius of its influence. In other words, if you spend quite a bit of time in one section of the city, the same song will play over and over and over again until you feel that if you hear that song one more time you might go on a killing spree for real. Although the talent acquired is impressive, the amount of variation is not. The entire soundtrack has less than 20 songs total, which would hardly make up just one of the many radio stations found in games like Vice City or GTA III.

One of the best aspects of the entire title is the simple fact that the 1988 arcade version of NARC comes bundled in as an unlockable extra. By simply collecting all of the hidden stashes in the USA level, you then can access an accurate rendition of the original that plays just as well as it did back in the day. There even is the ability to have an additional player join in the fray and you can both work together ridding the lands of the dreaded criminals looking to take over the world. There are also additional special missions which can be unlocked by obtaining all of the hidden stashes in the Asia level. Although having the original version is great, one might have expected to find additional extras, like interviews with the development teams, either past or present, or possibly some other historic information to help educate the modern-day gamer on the history of the title that they are playing.

Gamers do have the opportunity to play two included mini-games when roaming through the city. Every once in a while you will come upon a street casino where you can try your luck at either a simplified version of craps or three card monte. You can play for cash, but these vendors won’t be sticking around for extended periods of time for you to rake in large amounts of cash. Honestly, these are nothing more than a cheap distraction and are only being mentioned so that gamers have the complete picture on what they can expect from the game.

Another disappointment is the lack of any multiplayer, outside of the original arcade version, or online options explored by this remake. The possibility for co-op or competitive play would have offered a big expansion on the shelf life of the game and its overall value would have increased tenfold. Hopefully this is planned for a future rendition, although there has been no word from Midway on any upcoming release.

NARC had some development issues that caused the game to slip from the original 2004 release to an early 2005 one. Midway did not expound on the reasons why the game had been pushed back. It may have been second thoughts on bringing out such a touchy title or it could have been development issues. Nevertheless, there were profound differences from the early press releases to the finished package that gamers got to experience. One could be easily convinced that early development was going down the wrong path and the game had to be radically retooled in a hurry to meet the new deadline. The overall experience feels like it was rushed out the door even with the two year development time.

For every aspect that was good, a bad one evens out the scales of justice to make this nothing more than a mediocre remake of a classic arcade game. Hardcore gamers will feel cheated, even with the $19.95 sticker price, while casual gamers might get a bit more from the title. Nevertheless, with so many other free-roaming titles available to the public there are quite a few better ones worthy of your time that you can choose from. Although not always true, you get exactly what you pay for when picking this title up. I would recommend waiting until you see this one in the clearance section before adding it to your library. At least this way you are sure to get your money’s worth from the game without feeling like you have been violated.

Difficulty: 5

Control: 6

Visuals:6

Audio: 7

Replayability: 4

Overall: 6.2