Fuck it. I’m not afraid to admit that this is a total guilty pleasure game. It’s a bit sad playing this game just because of all the wasted potential throughout. It just doesn’t seem like there was any leadership throughout this games development, and especially in the story. Full of messy and conflicting themes, characters who never get a chance to fully be developed, and a story with writing that can only be explained as being awful. it really sucks playing through this game because every now and then there is a moment of light that shines through, i notice characters with potential to be complex, i see a story with a desire to make a statement, but this game just fumbles the ball at every chance it gets.

With how bad the story is, i’m just glad that the gameplay is at least good (enough). Gunplay and driving is good, but hacking is what makes this game loads of fun and opens up a lot of opportunities to spice up the gameplay a little bit. What would just be a normal gunfight, police chase, or stealth mission in most other open world sandboxes is so much more fun here with how different i can make each of them. It’s just such a shame that gameplay is always so buggy and the ai really sucks.

Something else Watch Dogs does so much better than most other open world sandboxes is that it has some great side content. There are the basic gang hideouts and such, but there’s also these fun mini games like Chess, Drinking competitions, and cash run which is just a parkour time trial that is made so much better just from how satisfying movement in this game is. The best side content comes from the digital trips which feel like completely different games.