Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice

Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice
File:Pursuit Force - Extreme Justice Coverart.png PAL game cover
Developer(s)	Bigbig Studios
Publisher(s)	SCEE, SCEA
Composer(s)	Richard Jacques Jeff Tymoschuk
Platforms	PlayStation Portable
Release date(s)
Genre(s)	Car combat, Action
Mode(s)	Single-player, Multiplayer

Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice is the sequel to Pursuit Force developed by Bigbig Studios and released in 2008. This game is exclusively available for the PlayStation Portable. A PlayStation 2 version was announced, but never released.

Plot

The player controls the Pursuit Force Commander, assigned with the task of taking down the biggest gangs at large in Capital State: The Syndicate: British bank robbers, The Raiders: professional pirates with a focus on stealing cargo, and the returning gangs of The Warlords and The Convicts, from the original Pursuit Force game. The objective is to eliminate the 'boss' of each gang, using any means necessary.

The game takes place 2 years after the events in the original. The wedding of the Commander and his teammate Sarah Hunter is interrupted by the Convicts, who have escaped from prison once again to take revenge on the Pursuit Force. Shortly afterwards, a police chase commences.

Shortly after stopping the convicts, Pursuit Force is about to apprehend Billy Wilde when a new police task force called Viper Squad appears to handle the situation themselves. Realizing they are unable to do much with Viper Squad, they return to handling cases which results in the arrival of the Syndicate as well as the Raiders. During a crime with the Raiders and Warlords, the Warlord's lieutenant kills Sarah, leaving the Commander in much grief.

Pursuit Force goes back to piecing together parts of the puzzle as they rescue nuclear physicist Dr. Pertwee as well as finding out why the criminals are cooperating. During a mission on attacking the Syndicate, they find out the Syndicate Lieutenant is in fact a MI:5 spy named Lucy, adding more to the complication of affairs as she is attempting to find who is carrying a majority of the nuclear weapons. It seems that the Convicts, Syndicate, and Raiders are merely the deliverers of the nuclear cargo, as it is the Warlords who intended with their own reasons to launch nukes at Capital City. The weaker gangs' leaders are summarily defeated and just as it seems like most of the cases are closed, a mole damages the Pursuit Force headquarters and injures the Chief.

As they try to figure out who is the mole of the Pursuit Force, it seems all fingers are pointed at the Recruits; Ashley, Preach and Gage. To add to the matters, a new unnamed masked gang begins terrorizing the city. Adding more to the issue, it is only after battling the Warlord General that it is revealed to be the Viper Squad Commander Decker responsible for the entire plot, while the Warlords have gone rogue already, Viper Squad intend to start a fascist police state in Capital City and have begun a campaign of terror on the innocents. During the President's visit to the city, his Viper convoy begins to attack him and the masked gang is revealed to have actually been members of Viper.

To add to the matters, it is revealed that Ashley was the mole of the team. A battle on the Viper copter leads to the death of the mole, but Preach is still questionably missing from the squad. However, worse fears are put aside as it is revealed Preach is fighting Viper with the cops until the team reunites. A fight at the hospital forces the Vipers to withdraw in their mobile headquarters and a final battle against Decker in a powered armor and his Electrical Field System protected car ends Viper Squad once and for all.

The ending results in a ceremony where the Pursuit Force is congratulated for their effort, however the Chief and the Commander are nowhere to be found. They are shown paying their last respects to Sarah at her grave, as they killed the man responsible for it all. The commander quits Pursuit Force, leaving without his badge and gun, but the Chief says that he will be back.

The Pursuit Force Team

• The Commander - The player character. The cop from the first Pursuit Force game, who has now been promoted. His real name is never mentioned.
• The Chief - The chief of the Pursuit Force. A gruff mustachioed stereotype who shouts a lot and gives the player orders throughout missions. Also appeared in the first game.
• Sarah Hunter - Helicopter pilot from the first game, reprises her role for part of Extreme Justice. Flies the Pursuit Force helicopter during missions.
• Gage - One of the new recruits, a supporting driver with many wise-cracks.
• Preach - Another new recruit, a stocky gunner who usually takes part in on-foot missions.
• Ashley - The last new recruit, an agile jumper and explosives expert.
• Lucy - An undercover MI:5 agent who replaces Sarah as the helicopter pilot.
• Doctor Pertwee - A nuclear physicist who is kidnapped by the Convicts and later rescued. Becomes the Science Specialist designing new weapons, cars, and more.

Gameplay

The player controls the Commander of a special section of the police known as the Pursuit Force, to combat the city's gangs. Gameplay is action-packed, fast-paced and "arcadey", played from a 3rd person perspective. The player pursues adversaries in cars, motorbikes, helicopters and boats, usually engaging in gun combat with them. The intensity of the fast sections are broken up with on-foot and on-rails gunning sequences. As in the original Pursuit Force, in many driving sections the player can jump from their vehicle onto enemy vehicles, have a firefight with the occupants, and if successful take control of the vehicle. Missions typically last around ten minutes and are split into distinctly different gameplay segments; for example a mission could involve a driving protect section, followed by a helicopter turret sequence and finished with an on-foot combat area. Enemies are from five distinctive gangs across a vast fictional state (Capital State, featuring Capital City) in America. Other members of the Pursuit Force often join the player as allies (controlled by the computer AI). A number of boss fights appear throughout the game, typically in control of vast signature vehicles (for example a huge hovercraft for the Raiders). The game features a "Justice" meter which fills as the player damages enemies and performs other feats. The Justice meter can be used for several things depending on whether it is partially filled or completely filled. When partially full the player can partially regain vehicle and character health. When the Justice meter is full the player can increase their damage and use a special attack, depending on the context. The player character's statistics can also be upgraded in a limited fashion as they progress through the game. Other features include Ad hoc multiplayer (with driving and on-foot modes), a challenge mode and a Pursuit Force shop where you can buy items such as game art, videos and cheats.

Cheats

One of the new features in the game are the cheats, split in two categories: Cheats and Super Cheats. Both can be bought from the in-game shop using stars won in Bounty mode. There are 9 Cheats and 8 Super Cheats. Cheats can make the game easier or harder. However, if more than one Cheat is active, the player can't progress in the game until all extra Cheats are disabled.

New Features

Improvements over this game's prequel include the following: New gangs of The Syndicate, Raiders and Viper Squad. Pursuit Force allies controlled by the AI. Multiplayer content. New vehicles (including a jet ski, hovercraft and motorcycle with a sidecar) as well as new boss vehicles including a tank, train and a plane. An upgrade system for the player character. Mid-mission checkpoints so the player doesn't need to return to the start of the level if they die. On-foot gameplay additions including crouching and hand-to-hand combat mini-game. Sniping. New maximum Justice powers. Extreme Justice was also meant to support cross-platform save games, allowing players to transfer save positions between the PSP and PS2 versions. However, as the PS2 version wasn't released, this option is unusable.

Reception

PlayStation the Official Magazine called it to be "one of our top PSP games" and rated it 4.5 out of 5 stars in their February '08 issue. The game received generally positive reviews, noting its mild improvement over its predecessor and featuring a more forgiving difficulty level. It averages 74.42% on Game Rankings and a 73/100 on MetaCritic.

External links

• Official US website at the Wayback Machine (archived March 9, 2009)