It's Sabotage!

IndieMonth · 2014-07-09T21:32:59Z

[b]By Valenka[/b] Imagine for a moment that Hotline Miami and Syndicate were getting busy with Starsky and Hutch on the television across the room and the Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage” playing in the background. It’s essentially the combination of the four that produced indie studio Modern Dream’s fourth creation: LA Cops. It’s currently in development and in a nutshell, it’s a fast-paced, top down shooter with a touch of strategic planning…and they hit the nail on the head. http://s2.n4g.com/media/11/... With an art style borrowed from one of their previous releases, The Button Affair, it truly feels as if you’ve climbed into a DeLorean and went back forty years. It’s bold, it’s vibrant and it feels exactly as it should. It creates an immersive environment while you’re kicking in doors with the intent of kicking butt and taking names. LA Cops puts you in the shoes of six different, playable law enforcement officers where you’ll control two of them at a time. It requires strategic thinking and planning before executing your mission and even clearing the next room. I didn’t know what to expect in terms of AI reactions, so I was brutally shot down as I kicked in a door and yelled “Freeze, sucka!” at my computer screen. I died more within the first five minutes of LA Cops than I did within an hour of Dark Souls, but that’s okay because it’s so much fun. http://s2.n4g.com/media/11/... After I got the hang of the overall concept, I managed to clear a few rooms in the first mission as Jo Murphy, the only female cop on the beat. Naturally, once I dropped the bad cats hanging around, I decided to gloat. “That’s right! She’s one foxy mama you just don’t want to mess with!” Needless to say, in my excitement of kicking some 70’s criminal rear, I got blasted from behind by a gangster with a shotgun because I’d missed a room. Learning has never been so enjoyable. Strategy plays a crucial role in LA Cops, if you want to complete your mission successfully. Utilizing the ability to switch between your two chosen officers is a key feature, as the game takes over one cop as you control the other, so any enemy that steps into your partner’s line of fire is dropped. Positioning is important, but so are split-second reflexes. Most of the time, some of the other criminals in the building will hear the commotion and burst out of the room to retaliate, and if your partner is too busy with another hostile, you’d better move. One strategy I used and then felt bad about was using my partner as bait and flanking the criminals from the other side just as they’d killed my partner. You aren’t penalized for the sabotage…but have fun carrying out the assignment alone. http://s2.n4g.com/media/11/... I’m most likely not playing the game the way most people would. I’m running in guns blazing while humming the Mission Impossible theme song, throwing retro, groovy insults. It’s perfectly fine though, because it seems that with LA Cops, there is no right or wrong way; it’s possible to accomplish your mission using numerous strategic plans or none whatsoever. It’s wonderful fun and I’m thrilled to be able to play the game on the go when it launches for mobile devices as well as the PC. There isn’t a concrete release date yet, but you can expect to see LA Cops sometime in the fourth quarter of 2014 on PC, Android and iOS as well. Oh my, it’s a mirage, I’m tellin’ y’all it’s sabotage! Day 10 | Modern Dream