APB Review

APB Conclusions

So, there’s a community there, and even though you’re forced into these artificial zones to do your shooting, you still see familiar names pop up now and again. However, that isn’t so much thanks to the mechanics of the game so much as the fact it’s a persistent world. It works only so much as any other shared space allows it to work.

Which is indicative of APB as a whole, really. Everything that works only does do because of the simple fact that it’s a game. The fun that comes out of joining up with some friends and taking on a group of enforcers is the same fun you can have in pretty much any other shooter – except other shooters are more fun. The driving too is a meagre shadow of the satisfaction that comes from a racer. Things work, but only in the most rudimentary of ways, and for a game that charges you for the time you spend, this is unacceptable.

Looking at APB that way though is to put aside the customisation features, which are the one area of the game that really lives up to the hype. They truly are astonishingly powerful tools, allowing you to create something wonderfully unique. Over and over again the Social District acts as a welcome break from the Action Districts, offering a few new pieces of clothing to fiddle around with for hours and hours.


Some people will love APB. They’ll lose themselves in the character customisation and be able to persevere through the Action Districts enough that their weapons overpower the need to fling yourself off one of the many climbable buildings that litter the city. However, the majority of those people have probably already found the game. Newcomers now are going to find themselves facing an almost sheer cliff of unfair fights, overpowered weaponry and locked features that make even attempting to enjoy the game an almost impossible feat.

We look back at that game from a year ago, the one we were teased and tantalised with, and it makes us sad. That version of APB is still here somewhere, but it’s hemmed in on all sides. Who knows, maybe it will resurface in the years to come; RealTime Worlds have stated that they intend to expand APB with new game modes rather than just new content.

Right now though, at launch, APB is a huge, broken…thing. This isn’t the sort of poetic broken like Pathalogic or Boiling Point either; this is just a sorry failed mess, where everything only just about works. There’s nothing inspiring or exciting on offer. Even the designers, which are so powerful and impressive, are forcefully neutered by a lack of options - they’ve got to get you into those Action Districts somehow!


The most promising thing about APB is that, for all its faults, most of them are relatively easy fixes. The weapon imbalance, our largest gripe, just requires a bit of attention to make bearable. Similarly, problems like locked texture resolution and lag will hopefully be ironed out, and if the rate of production in regards to designs and clothing continues to grow exponentially, we’re going to see some truly astonishing things appear.

Then again though, these are old problems that have been carried from the Beta to the final game. Maybe they’ll be fixed, but it seems like that if they were going to to be remedied then they would have been addressed already. For some reason, it seems like APB was intended to be this way – and that means APB isn’t a game you want to spend any time on.

Score Guide