The Precinct review: Arrested development

The Precinct puts you in the shoes of a rookie cop and initially does a solid job of making you feel like you’re truly on the force. Whether you're patrolling the streets on foot, cruising through the city in a squad car, or taking to the skies in a police helicopter, the game captures the thrill of early days on the job. There’s a real sense of excitement as you begin learning the ropes and tackling your first shifts. But like many real-world careers, that excitement quickly fades.

Its core issue is that it clearly aspires to be a gritty, immersive police simulator—but it struggles to deliver on that promise. From the moment you start playing, it’s obvious what kind of experience the game is aiming for—yet it misses the mark. Despite the occasional flash of potential, The Precinct is ultimately held back by its overambition and lack of focus, making it difficult to stay engaged beyond the first few hours.

Vice City Stories

Set in the gritty, noir-inspired Averno City—a fictionalized, 1980s-flavored take on New York—The Precinct is initially captivating. The city’s top-down perspective evokes the charm of classic Grand Theft Auto titles, but with a moral twist: this time, you're the good guy. Playing as the son of the city’s late police chief, you begin your career eager to make a difference. The game’s early hours are engaging as you learn the ropes—patrolling neighborhoods, pulling over reckless drivers, and responding to calls from dispatch.

Its story is told in still cutscene conversations that involve various of the Averno City Police Department either detailing your tasks for that day’s shift or filling you in on some undergoing investigations into the city’s most notorious gang . Nick is still a rookie cop, but he quickly finds himself getting involved in taking down a couple of crime syndicates and helping detectives find the culprit of a string of mysterious murders throughout the city.

This is the game’s narrative hook, and the only bit of storytelling you get that motivates you to head to work every day. Part of the issue with the game’s format is that it resembles that of a sandbox police simulation, but it also tries to give you a story inspired by classic cop movies—think mysterious killer, justice for the protagonist, and crusty partner cop with a heart of gold. Sadly, the story fails to find its rhythm, and what you get is a game that makes you feel like you are working with no specific goal in mind.

Beat Cop’s Grind

Each in-game day follows a predictable routine: start your shift, wait for a crime to occur, respond, repeat. Because incidents are triggered randomly, you’ll often find yourself aimlessly driving or walking in circles, waiting for dispatch to finally give you something to do. And when a call does come in, the excitement is often short-lived. Apprehending suspects involves running through a checklist—checking IDs, searching for drugs or weapons, istering breathalyzer tests, and selecting the correct charge before arresting them or issuing them fines. It feels fresh the first few times, but the lack of variation or depth quickly makes it feel like busywork.

Sure, there are some entertaining moments early on. Pulling someone over for speeding only to find out they have a murder warrant can be thrilling. Watching a fleeing suspect launch their car into the ocean and surrender in defeat is hilarious. Even writing a parking ticket for someone who left their car on the sidewalk has an odd sense of satisfaction—at least at first. But when you’re doing the same thing every day, the novelty wears thin fast.

What makes matters worse is how slow the game can feel when there’s nothing happening. While dispatch occasionally assigns you specific crimes, many shifts boil down to handing out parking tickets or walking a set route hoping something triggers. At times I even flung myself into traffic to then chase after the car that ran me over and charge them with a hit and run. Other times I would just randomly profile people and ask for their IDs hoping they had a prior warrant that would guarantee an arrest. Ultimately, it doesn’t take long for the repetition to become tedious.

All Patrol, No Payoff

The game’s main story, centered on gang activity and a string of theatrical murders, is meant to add purpose to your patrols. You're tasked with gathering enough evidence to take down key crime syndicates, culminating in showdowns through chases, shootouts, or stakeouts. But the problem is, these clues only appear randomly during regular crimes. Some shifts may yield one or two pieces of evidence, others none. There's no clear direction on how to progress the narrative, turning what should be a gripping investigation into a frustrating guessing game.

It’s a flawed system, especially considering that each shift can take anywhere from 8 to 12 in-game hours. When you’re stuck repeating the same handful of scenarios, the grind becomes apparent. Averno City itself isn’t large either, which means you’ll spend a lot of time retracing the same streets, dealing with the same situations, and arresting what feels like the same suspects over and over again. Didn’t they learn their lesson the first two times you arrested them?

Badges and Bugs

To make matters worse, your time as a cop in The Precinct is riddled with performance issues and odd design decisions. For example, cars would frequently glitch and get stuck on your character if you bumped into them—ironically allowing you to speed them up and issue a ticket for speeding. You're also graded on your shift performance, but oddly enough, crashing into pedestrians or causing property damage doesn't negatively affect your score. As long as you to read suspects their Miranda rights, you can wreak all the havoc you want without consequence.

The top-down perspective, while fitting for the retro aesthetic, also creates its own problems—especially during helicopter sequences. You're supposed to track criminals from above using a spotlight, but visibility is so poor that it's hard to tell what's happening on the ground, making these segments feel more frustrating than exciting.

When it comes to processing suspects, the game offers an option to skip the manual work and let your partner automatically charge them. While this saves time, it comes at the cost of earning less XP. Your partner also tags along on every shift, and the game even warns you to wait for him before driving off. But that warning is meaningless as he’ll always magically teleport into your car at no penalty to you.

Outside of crime-fighting, The Precinct throws in drag races and time trials as optional side activities. These offer a slight change of pace but serve little purpose beyond earning bragging rights and a bit of extra XP. That XP can be used to upgrade your abilities—things like stamina, vehicle durability, or backup —but once you’ve maxed out your stats, you’re left with nothing but the same old grind.

Final Thoughts

The Precinct looks the part and briefly plays it, too. Its early hours make you feel like a genuine cop, navigating the complexities of a city plagued by crime. But it quickly becomes clear that the game lacks the structure and depth to sustain its premise. The repetition is relentless, the map is too small, and the systems that should provide progression instead feel random and unrewarding.

The game tries to walk a fine line between being an open-world police sim and a narrative-driven cop drama, blending sandbox gameplay with a storyline centered on gang takedowns and theatrical serial killings. But despite the promising setup, the story unfolds mostly through static cutscenes and never gains any real traction. What should feel like a gripping descent into the city’s criminal underworld ends up fading into the background, overshadowed by the repetitive, day-to-day routine of life as a beat cop.