The Crew – Faction Wars and Late-Game Content
Drive where you want, how you want – and never drive alone. We’ve shared with you quite a bit about how The Crew lets you customize your path across America. How you can be a tourist, exploring the countryside while taking on all kinds of challenges along the way. And how it’s a social experience, allowing you to seamlessly “crew up” with other players – both friends and strangers alike. But what about the core driving experience? How does that hold up, especially as you head deeper into the game?
Very well, indeed. In a recent playtest, we were dropped into The Crew near the end of the storyline, as a Level 47 driver, and we completed a handful of missions to reach Level 50. The best part? It was tough. It was challenging. And, most of all, it was fun.
The most noticeable aspect of this late-game content? How differently each type of car handles. While this is clear early on in The Crew, it feels even more pronounced during these late-game races and missions. Barreling up a mountain path using a Raid Spec car is a completely different experience than finesse driving with a Circuit Spec ride. The former requires a fearless, reckless abandon, while the latter had us carefully blipping the brakes and goosing the gas in order to nail the best racing line. In another mission, we had to take down a prison bus while avoiding the police – perhaps the most challenging of the handful we tested – and this time we used a customized ride built for a combination of speed and durability. It took our crew a few tries, but when we finally completed this mission, we literally stood up and cheered. The late-game missions were all thrilling and exhilarating – and a great showcase for how a crew can work together to accomplish a shared goal.
Of course, the game doesn’t end when the story does. Completing the story unlocks all kinds of goodies, including some Platinum Parts, which will be a big help as players jump into Faction Wars – a metagame that will keep drivers engaged for countless days, weeks, months… perhaps even years.
Car Wars
What exactly is Faction Wars? In the simplest sense, it’s The Crew’s approach to PvP. But it’s also much more. Early on in the campaign, players will gain access to this aspect of the game, at which point they can join one of five factions. This opens up a range of missions, some of which can be played solo and others with a crew. As players win these missions, they’ll rank up within their chosen faction. They’ll also earn more cash, which can be used to expand their garage and upgrade their vehicles.
Being part of a faction has two overarching benefits. First, as a faction does better overall, more missions are unlocked. Second, if you’re part of the faction with the most reputation points in your region at the end of the month, you’ll receive additional rewards and access to exclusive content (along with other members of your faction).
Of course, faction missions are also a total blast. Pitting our four-person crew against an opposing crew (with a mix of devs, press and Frag Dolls on each crew), we took to the streets in a few different races. While playing against the game (PvE) is competitive enough – with individuals vying for the top ranking while working together to achieve a common goal – the PvP aspect really brought out both the competitive and cooperative spirit in all of us. Knowing that four other humans were on the other side of this race, and knowing that teamwork was as important as our own achievement, we communicated even more than in group PvE missions, sharing shortcuts with each other and working to flank our foes so we could box them in. It was raucously, riotously fun.
On the Road
The Crew will launch with 25 faction missions, with plans to add more every month. The missions will range from solo to four-vs-four PvP, so you can satisfy both your solitary and competitive urges. Drivers can also switch factions any time within the first three weeks of a month (but you can only belong to one faction at a time). Be careful, though: Changing factions throughout the month will limit your individual reward, which is determined based on how much you contributed to your final faction at the end of each month. That said, this system allows players to choose what’s more important: individual gains (perhaps boosted by being in a weaker faction) or shared rewards (from being part of a stronger faction).
Faction Wars isn’t just a great way to keep playing The Crew long after you finish the main missions. It’s also one of the only ways to unlock certain rewards, including some exclusive vehicles. And with plans for continued support, Faction Wars will be a source of new content to keep players racing down the road for years to come.
Head out on the highway with more UbiBlog features about The Crew:
The Crew – Takedowns, Team Racing, and Misuse Of a National Park