Crackdown 3 shows explosions

Crackdown has always been famous for B.S.U.*, and as you all saw at gamescom last year, we’re getting ready to take destruction to a whole new level!

Everyone on the development team is excited to bring you a game-changing — no, make that world-changing — destructive experience. But that’s not all we’re trying to accomplish in the area of explosions. We’ve got top combat designers and animators, FX artists, and audio engineers working tirelessly to max-out every bit of the explosive fun. 

We start by looking at explosions as science experiments, cause and effect on clear display. No matter if it’s born from a rocket, a grenade, a limpet mine, or a breaching charge, something detonates and damage spreads — and in the world of Crackdown, that’s when opportunities arise.

Sometimes it starts with a devastating shockwave that explodes out and shatters the glass face of a nearby skyscraper — revealing the enemy that’s hiding inside, just waiting for your long-range kill-shot.

Some explosions spark and catch fire, sending opponents rushing from the blaze and right into your sights — or better yet, right into the path of the burning building as it crashes down from complete structural collapse.

Sometimes it’s all about “impulse” and using a precisely-timed blast to send things flying: launching cars into the air (and keeping them suspended there with a bevy of rocket shots); knocking enemies through walls — or catapulting them across rooftops — or hurling them into explosive barrels that have been daisy-chained around the city and triggering a pyrotechnic chain reaction big enough for all to see.

In Crackdown 3, explosives take front-and-center when it comes to the destructible world we’re building for multiplayer, and for the open-world playset of campaign. Whether you’re deploying a cluster grenade to disassemble a squad of mechs, or taking down a skybridge while another player runs across, or toppling a tower to create a path for your teammates to infiltrate the enemy’s stronghold — explosives and the explosive skill are a critical part of making every corner of the Crackdown world versatile and exciting.

Yes, hidden away in incubation chambers and playtest labs across the globe, our dev team is hard at work devising the most cutting-edge explosive events imaginable. But we’re all aware that there’s a more powerful element in the equation, one that we can’t possibly simulate or control: You.

Crackdown players are the ultimate x-factor — and we can’t wait to see how you blow-up our world.