True Crime Message Board

#sleepingdogs Publishing executives say complimentary stuff about their upcoming games all of the time. So what. But there's an unusual history with Sleeping Dogs, which Square Enix will release Aug. 14—it was formerly known as True Crime: Hong Kong until Activision washed its hands of the franchise in the Feb. 2011 bloodbath that killed off Guitar Hero. More »

#sleepingdogs Undercover cop and protagonist Wei Shen of Sleeping Dogs—previously known as True Crime: Hong Kong—is on assignment in Hong Kong as an undercover cop. Fronting as a deported man come at long last back to Hong Kong, Wei Shen is on a mission to take down the local triad organization by the name of Sun Oh Yee. More »

#sleepingdogs There's a lot of action in this trailer for Sleeping Dogs, once known as True Crime: Hong Kong, which publisher Square Enix officially re-announced today. Unfortunately, none of it looks anything like a game. More »

True Crime: Hong Kong won't be called that when Square Enix ships it sometime in the future.

I was genuinely surprised when word arrived that Activision was dropping True Crime: Hong Kong after spending years of development on the series reboot with United Front Games.

Activision tends to prefer big with its releases, but it's been known to back some less-sure bets like Prototype, Blur and Singularity. True Crime: Hong Kong was not to have such a fate, with Activision cutting its losses.

Surprisingly, Square Enix has come to the rescue.

Gamasutra reports the Japanese publisher has picked up the development rights to True Crime: Hong Kong--but not the franchise itself. Square Enix will be re-branding the game, a change not yet finalized.

United Front is still working on the game in collaboration with Square Enix London Studios.

"When we first saw and got our hands on the game we fell in love with it," said Square Enix London Studios general manager Lee Singleton in his interview with Gamasutra.

There are plenty of details on Activision's decision making process in regards to True Crime: Hong Kong from my story this past May, wherein I broke down an internal memo explaining the cancellation.

"As many of you on the team know, I have a lot of heart for this game," said Activision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg, in a memo distributed to employees in February. "And there are many great things about it. Stopping now is a hard pill to swallow, because a lot of blood, sweat and tears have gone into getting the game this far. However, after two pushed deadlines and a huge increase in the original production budget, we needed to take a clear-eyed look at the reality of this game’s potential."

In short, Hirshberg didn't foresee True Crime: Hong Kong becoming a blockbuster on the scale of a Grand Theft Auto, and without blockbuster potential, it didn't make sense to compete.

"Even our most optimistic internal projections showed that True Crime Hong Kong was not going to be at or near the top of the competitive open world genre," said Hirshberg. "In an industry where only the best games in each category are flourishing, and for a game with a budget of this size, to be blunt, it just wasn’t going to be good enough."

For Square Enix, however, it's apparently more than good enough.

#rumor Publisher Activision may have just added a few more games and development studios to kill count. An unconfirmed report from Eurogamer says that the mega-publisher has axed the Guitar Hero franchise, killed its True Crime reboot and fired most of Freestyle Games. More »

Activision's recently released Q2 2011 investor's report contains a bit of bad news for United Front Games' upcoming reboot of the True Crime franchise -- or good news, depending on how you look at it. According to the report, True Crime: Hong Kong's super ambiguous 2010 release window has been pushed to an equally ambiguous 2011 release window, which Activision hopes will "give the development team more time to deliver the high-quality entertainment experience they envision for the game."

We normally can't help but scoff when publishers give this excuse when pushing back the release of one of their titles, but in this case, we'll let it slide. We're not sure if you've heard, but Hong Kong is ... um, kind of big.

Activision's recently released Q2 2011 investor's report contains a bit of bad news for United Front Games' upcoming reboot of the True Crime franchise -- or good news, depending on how you look at it. According to the report, the game's super ambiguous 2010 release window has been pushed to an equally ambiguous 2011 release window, which Activision hopes will "give the development team more time to deliver the high-quality entertainment experience they envision for the game."

We normally can't help but scoff when publishers give this excuse when pushing back the release of one of their titles, but in this case, we'll let it slide. We're not sure if you've heard, but Hong Kong is ... um, kind of big.

Activision's recently released Q2 2011 investor's report contains a bit of bad news for United Front Games' upcoming reboot of the True Crime franchise -- or good news, depending on how you look at it. According to the report, the game's super ambiguous 2010 release window has been pushed to an equally ambiguous 2011 release window, which Activision hopes will "give the development team more time to deliver the high-quality entertainment experience they envision for the game."

We normally can't help but scoff when publishers give this excuse when pushing back the release of one of their titles, but in this case, we'll let it slide. We're not sure if you've heard, but Hong Kong is ... um, kind of big.

#clips As we mentioned earlier this week, GDC got some class this year with some pole-dancing, clothes-on erotic dancers. More »

#truecrime Activision, the company that publishes Guitar Hero and Call of Duty, did not get the memo. The recent Game Developers Conference is not the venue for half-naked pole dancers. More »

#gdc10 Activision's True Crime series goes back to the drawing board with a Hong Kong action-adventure reboot, a game that puts the player in the role of an undercover cop, one who knows how to use a freezer door in a fight. More »

Airjacking returns.

Disarm and kill.

click to enlarge

After a five-year hiatus, free-roaming felony franchise True Crime is set to return (sans subtitle) in Fall 2010. United Front, which is also working on the upcoming ModNation Racers and houses veterans from games such as Bully, Prototype and Scarface, is developing the new entry for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Lead producer Jeff O'Connell describes it as a "more serious" reboot -- and a story that's more closely modeled after cop films. "It's an opportunity to be an innately good guy," he said of the undercover, under-pressure role you'll assume. "That's good drama."

Inspired by films like "The Departed" (see: "Infernal Affairs"), True Crime follows undercover lawman Wei Shen as he infiltrates the triad, slow-mo kicks enemies in the chin, and completes objectives across the game's new city playground. "Is it an accurate representation of Hong Kong?" O'Connell asked. "It's not." Despite referencing over 27,000 photographs, the city has been "tuned for gameplay," eschewing a realistic, street-for-street recreation in favor of a more cinematic and moody Hong Kong.

Multi-million unit selling franchise reboots with new studio, and all-new cinema style action inspired story, characters and location.

Undercover and making sacrifices.

The second world premiere of the VGAs was the full version of the teaser we saw a couple weeks ago -- you know, the one we initially presumed was for another installment in the True Crime series? Yeah, well, it was totally for another installment in the True Crime series, which is being developed by ModNation Racers creators United Front. Guess there's no more mystery as to what Activision's upcoming Hong Kong-set action title is, huh? It'll be a little while before we can get the high definition version of the trailer up, but until then, check out a screengrabbed version of the trailer after the jump, and feel confident in the fact that we're very good guessers. Update: Okay, GameTrailers has posted a non-terrible-looking version of the trailer, which we've re-posted after the jump.

Activision's free roaming crime simulator hits the streets of China.

Game is unveiled at the VGA awards.