sleeping dogs definitive edition pc vs xbone

Sleeping Dogs follows Wei Shen, an American-raised Asian bruiser who returns to his native Hong Kong following a stint Stateside. It also doesn’t hurt that Sleeping Dogs has a pretty layered and interesting story at its heart, which, when you consider how many clichéd tropes the plot has, is pretty impressive.

In short, United Front’s aim to make players feel as though they’re starring in their own Hong Kong action film is incredibly well realised. Shoving a thug’s face into a wall fan or kicking them down an open elevator shaft never gets old. Combat is particularly satisfying beyond using martial arts combos to hammer foes, players can use items in their environment to execute pretty grisly finishers. The story missions follow a basic GTA template – chases, gunfights, beatdowns and the like – but they’re all very well executed and Sleeping Dogs doesn’t run out of ideas before the end credits (even if a large portion of those ideas have been pilfered). There’s also a reputation system that’s based on how the player interacts with NPCs. They can even drop into a massage parlour for some R&R if they fancy.Įverything the player does feeds into a leveling system in which they can unlock new moves and abilities. Players can also bust up drug rings by driving rival gangs off their turf, hacking nearby cameras and having the local police arrest dealers when they arrive. Alongside story missions, the city is filled with activities, ranging from fight clubs, to gambling dens, to street races, to cock fights, to training at the local dojo. The game’s open world city of Hong Kong isn’t an exact replica of the real thing, but it captures the neon-encrusted majesty and sleaze of the place beautifully. United Front has done a bang up job of making all this action easy to pick up and heaps of fun to play. In Sleeping Dogs, players will engage in rooftop free-running, car chases, brutal hand-to-hand combat and visceral gun battles that involve both pop-and-cover mechanics and the odd spurt of bullet-time. The reason for this is, in part, down to the game’s mechanics and controls, which are sublime to use and well-mapped to boot.

It doesn’t break much new ground in terms of its structure and gameplay, but Sleeping Dogs is easily one of the best – and underrated – open world games of the last generation. If you can’t wait to check out GTA 5 on a current gen machine, Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition will scratch that itch and then some. If you’ve never played Sleeping Dogs, United Front’s homage to both the Grand Theft Auto franchise and Hong Kong cinema’s early 90s bullet-festival heyday, close the browser now and pick up a copy. Available on PS4 (reviewed), Xbox One and PC

Sleeping dogs definitive edition pc vs xbone