• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
WebSetNet

WebSetNet

Technology News

  • Technology News
    • Mobile
    • Games
  • Internet Marketing
  • System Admin
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Mac & Apple
    • Website Scripts
      • Wordpress

Beat Cop review

August 5, 2020 by Martin6

The Brooklyn of Beat Cop often feels like the New York that I love, re-rendered in pixel art. Brownstone buildings crowded with mom-and-pop stores; hotdog carts doing business, street dancers on the curb; cats lounging on window sills; metalheads rocking out, dudes bursting onto their balconies to perform their morning aerobics, unmoved by the thought of an audience. By midday, the streets are bustling. Suits and hippies, gangbangers and priests, everyone and anyone who might conceivably live in this time management-adventure hybrid of an ’80s cop-simulator. More than once, Beat Cop has made me pause, nostalgic for the city of my heart.

Then, I pass by the little black girl eating a slice of watermelon on a stoop.

 

  • Publisher: 11 bit studios
  • Developer: Pixel Crow
  • Platform: Reviewed on PC
  • Availability: Out now on PC

I have complicated feelings about Beat Cop, which is steeped in a kind of low-key awful. Second-tier racist epithets are everywhere; everyone’s a stereotype, down to the portly passerby who growls about how there’s “lotto wildlife” in these parts. Your colleagues at the precinct aren’t particularly nice either, cracking jokes that’d likely earn them a trip to HR today.

None of this is inappropriate to the atmosphere. New York City in the 80s was a grim place, plagued with extortion scandals and crooked cops like the felonious Michael Dowd.

But it still makes my teeth hurt.

Maybe that’s the point.

Beat Cop is a weirdly gruelling experience. You’re a disgraced detective turned beat cop, doomed to writing tickets for the conceivable future. Your boss is an ass, your reputation is in shambles, and there is a very large chance you might not survive the mean streets of Brooklyn, not with rising tensions between the Mafia and the Crew, both of whom seem eager to solicit your reluctant co-operation. If you’re lucky, though, you might make headway into your personal dilemma – or you can just hitch an expensive ride to Mexico. It’s up to you, pal.

If all this sounds overwhelming, it kinda is. Beat Cop is a lot of busywork, a lot of fighting to fulfill the tasks expected of you, a lot of going “Oh, crap” when the game throws an unexpected curveball, demanding that you figure out whether you’re going to tail someone for the Crew, or help the local pizzeria watch for thieves. And all of this takes place in real time, with the game carving speedily away at the hours, an uncertain future still stretching ahead.

Sometimes, you end up making choices.

Sometimes, frozen with indecision, you back away and go back to parking tickets.

Sometimes, you get shot for hesitating. (Thankfully, in the event of death or even a mere change of heart, the game allows you to rewind the day.)

Everything in Beat Cop is done with a click of the left mouse button, and most of the gameplay consists of writing tickets: an exercise that involves left-clicking on the vehicle, selecting an action from a menu, and then, maybe, hitting the ‘call towing’ button on your walkie-talkie.

From time to time, you’ll be called on to apprehend small-time crooks. This involves furiously left-clicking down the street towards the suspect, before hitting the handcuffs in your inventory. Kelly will do the rest. Similarly, the shoot-outs are a case of watching the crosshairs and then clicking on the gun when the cursor aligns over your target. And everything left in between? More clicking, obviously.

For the first hour or so, none of this really gelled for me. It wasn’t fun. I’d read in an interview somewhere that Pixel Crow was inspired by the seminal Papers, Please, but Beat Cop lacked that sense of cold, plodding nihilism. The game’s moments of levity rang too shrilly, and that low hum of ambient bigotry shaved at my nerves like a cheese grater. I got tired of everyone’s shit.

The endless responsibilities, the looming Ghost of Alimony Futures, that ticking suspicion that something, somewhere is going to go horrifically wrong. And always, always, those parking tickets and the idiots who’d snarl at me for doing this thankless job. As the hours wore on, I found myself caring less and less about doing the right thing, Every new offer of a bribe became more tempting than the last. And really, what’s wrong with running a few errands for the mob? A quick $100 is a lot to a dude down to his luck, especially one who is already swimming with the sharks.

 

But then a man threatened to set himself on fire in front of the church on a day with a lousy quota. I bolted to action, a timer ticking through its red numbers, and halfway through, found myself slowing and thinking, “Man. I could probably afford to write this ticket.” Fictional scenario or not, it struck me as to how horrible that thought was. Here I was, racing to save a guy. How could I even think about parking tickets?

I resolved the matter, however. I went back to tickets. Then, I got called on to figure a disturbance in someone’s apartment and ended up indebted to the mob. All because I wanted to do right by the people. Then, I got shouted at by the police for not arresting the perp. Because Reasons.

When Kelly snarled at the next good-for-nothing who snapped at me for writing a ticket, well, I won’t lie. It was immensely satisfying. This game wants your soul on its key ring and like it or not, you give it what it asks.

I don’t know how I feel about Beat Cop. I can’t stomach long sessions of the game, but I keep going back. I don’t like the quiet awfulness of the setting, but that could be a Cass-thing rather than any fault of the developers. It is clear that Pixel Crow wanted us to understand that this is a terrible existence to inhabit and while they did seriously screw up some elements of the presentation, I get where they’re coming from. Beat Cop could stand a few more round of updates, however. There are still a few graphical glitches to be ironed out. But it is a game that will likely delight a sub-set of players. Unfortunately, I’m not quite one of them.

Source

Related posts:

  1. Google Pixel 5 review: The best Pixel ever
  2. Google Maps now lets you pay for parking with Google Pay, starting in Austin
  3. Early Google Pixel 4a performance review compares the 2020 mid-range Pixel to the Pixel 4, Pixel 3a, and Pixel 3 XL
  4. Google Pixel 5a 5G release date, rumours, features and specs
  5. These are the best games for your Android phone
  6. Google Pixel 6a rumours, features and news
  7. Google Pixel 5 vs Pixel 4a 5G vs Pixel 4a: What’s the difference?
  8. Grab The Elder Scrolls Online and more in this week’s Xbox Deals with Gold
  9. The best free iPhone games on the planet
  10. The best free Android games in 2017: try these out now

Filed Under: Time

Primary Sidebar

Trending

  • How to fix Windows Update Error 80244019
  • Windows 10 Update keeps failing with error 0x8007001f – 0x20006
  • How To Change Netflix Download Location In Windows 10
  • Troubleshoot Outlook “Not implemented” Unable to Send Email Error
  • How do I enable or disable Alt Gr key on Windows 10 keyboard
  • How To Install Android App APK on Samsung Tizen OS Device
  • 3 Ways To Open PST File Without Office Outlook In Windows 10
  • FIX: Windows Update error 0x800f0986
  • How to Retrieve Deleted Messages on Snapchat
  • Latest Samsung Galaxy Note 20 leak is a spec dump revealing key features
  • Install Android 7.0 Nougat ROM on Galaxy Core 2 SM-G355H
  • 192.168.1.1 Login, Admin Page, Username, Password | Wireless Router Settings
  • Websites to Watch Movies Online – 10+ Best Websites Without SignUp/Downloading
  • How to Backup SMS Messages on Your Android Smartphone
  • How to delete a blank page at the end of a Microsoft Word document
  • Fix: The Disc Image File Is Corrupted Error In Windows 10
  • Android 11 Custom ROM List – Unofficially Update Your Android Phone!
  • Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3 could be scheduled for June 2021, with S Pen support

Footer

Tags

Amazon amazon prime amazon prime video Apple Application software epic games Galaxy Note 20 Galaxy S22 Plus Galaxy S22 Ultra Google Sheets headphones Huawei icloud Instagram instant gaming ip address iPhone iphone 12 iphone 13 iphone 13 pro max macOS Microsoft Microsoft Edge Mobile app office 365 outlook Pixel 6 Samsung Galaxy Samsung Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Smartphone speedtest speed test teams tiktok Twitter vpn WhatsApp whatsapp web Windows 10 Windows 11 Changes Windows 11 Release Windows 11 Update Windows Subsystem For Android Windows 11 Xiaomi

Archives

  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020

Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org