Set in Averno City, 1983, you’ll need to clean up the city, uncover the truth, and embark on thrilling chases through a corrupt metropolis in this neon-noir sandbox police game. The Precinct Limited Edition is available now, exclusively at JB HiFi, on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S.
The Precinct, a new action-adventure game out of Fallen Tree Games, feels in so many ways like an homage to the older Grand Theft Auto games. It has a top-down, nearer to an isometric viewpoint, which feels like a return to that eye-in-the-sky perspective that had Rockstar’s crime simulators feeling like a breaking news report throughout its action. Although The Precinct is similar in presentation, its pitch leans much closer to the lawful good end of the spectrum.
Instead of being placed in the shoes of a drug kingpin or racketeer, you’re a rookie cop in what is perhaps the most refreshingly clichéd plot I’ve seen in a crime game in ages. Just as you, as Cordell, regularly hit your beat, this story certainly hits its expected beats, too. You’re a second-generation cop to a revered former chief who died under odd circumstances, and all your new chief does is breathlessly, and suspiciously, glaze him every second he’s in your presence. You’ve got a tired old partner who’s nearing his retirement, which gives your budding friendship a real Lethal Weapon vibe. If this game doesn’t eventually pull out a “give me your gun and badge” scene, I’d be immensely disappointed.
But as I work through the game’s story with an expectant grin on my face, I’m finding myself drawn into the game’s core loop, which, antithetical to Grand Theft Auto, focuses on peacekeeping and being the city’s arm of justice rather than a hardened criminal. So much of this comes through the menial tasks of people-watching and simple observation.
And I am loving this side of police work in Averno City.
The Precinct doesn’t go full ass into painting the police as wholly good, just as it doesn’t paint the people of Averno City as bad. It’s a world that feels like a fictional extension of New York City, where people, more often than not, are operating in the grey. There are “good guys” on the take, there are also citizens who’ve made a poor, split-second decision, and it’s finding the correct resolution to all manner of infractions, as a beat cop, that satisfyingly scratches the itch in my procedure-driven lizard brain. Through your partner, Kelly, it’s drilled into you early about what you’re expected to look out for, how not to infringe on someone’s rights unlawfully, right through to how to execute an arrest without using an excess of force.
Most people would find exhilaration in ducking behind a dumpster and having a firefight with a couple of caught burglars who aren’t looking to go quietly, I find it in walking my beat and handing out parking tickets. What exactly does that say about me? I don’t know, however, I would find great satisfaction in ticketing cars that had parked on the curb, obstructed a fire hydrant, or simply overrun their meter; it was an easy case of, as my grandma would say, “bloody revenue raising”.
While the game feels a lot like Grand Theft Auto of old, it is also reminiscent of Police Quest of even older. But make no mistake, though its influences are worn on its sleeve, The Precinct blends core concepts from both to create a cohesive experience that is both fresh and engaging.
After a while, going by the book, as you did in Police Quest, feels like following a formula, and I fell into a rhythm of running IDs, patting perps down, booking them with infringements, and, if required, arresting them after a rendition of their Miranda rights. Being a good cop, even virtually, requires a certain amount of learning to commit procedures to memory. The game’s procedural crime does paint Averno City as a rather bustling metropolis of misdeeds where crime is around literally every corner.
For a game that put up a facade to perhaps draw in the Grand Theft Auto crowd, what The Precinct actually manages to deliver as a simulation of day-to-day life as an upstart beat cop feels unexpectedly authentic. From the moment to press through the verge separating the station’s foyer and the rest of it, go past holding into the bullpen, it feels like a real-to-life cop shop. The central junior desks feel like a feature attraction to the senior detectives and the chief, while they’re also flanked by the briefing room, where you’ll be assigned a beat.
So while you’ll observe plenty of Grand Theft Auto in this game, both symbolically and literally, I do think The Precinct quickly sets itself apart from Rockstar’s crime-filled sandboxes by placing the player on the right end of justice. The Clash popularised it, The Bobby Fuller Four sang it originally, but they, along with the dastardly criminals of Averno City, will be screaming the same thing by the time you’re done.
“I fought the law, and the law won.”
