is a run and gun arcade game released by Sega in 1989 and ported to the

Sega Mega Drive/Genesis The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Syst ...

in 1990 in Japan and 1991 in North America by Sage's Creation. It was also ported and released to a number of home computer platforms by

U.S. Gold U.S. Gold Limited was a British video game publisher based in Witton, Birmingham, England. The company was founded in 1984 by Anne and Geoff Brown in parallel to their distributor firm, CentreSoft, both of which became part of Woodward Brown H ...

. The Mega Drive version of ''Crack Down'' was re-released on the

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major home game console, ...

Virtual Console A virtual console (VC) – also known as a virtual terminal (VT) – is a conceptual combination of the keyboard and display for a computer user interface. It is a feature of some Unix-like operating systems such as Linux, BSD, illumos, Un ...

in Japan on August 7, 2007 and in

PAL region The PAL region is a television publication territory that covers most of Europe and Africa, alongside parts of Asia, South America and Oceania. It is named PAL because of the PAL (Phase Alternating Line) television standard traditionally used i ...

s on September 7, 2007. It also released on

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on June 1, 2010.

Gameplay

Using a top-down perspective (akin to ''

Gauntlet Gauntlet or the gauntlet may refer to: Common uses *Gauntlet (glove), protective gloves used as a form of armor *Running the gauntlet, a form of physical punishment Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional characters *Gauntlet (comics), a Marvel ...

''), the player controls either Ben or Andy, a pair of agents charged with stopping

mad scientist The mad scientist (also mad doctor or mad professor) is a stock character of a scientist who is perceived as " mad, bad and dangerous to know" or " insane" owing to a combination of unusual or unsettling personality traits and the unabashedly a ...

Mr. X (Mr.K in the ''

Sega Mega Drive The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Syst ...

'' version) from taking over the world, as they make their way through several timed levels, planting bombs and destroying

cyborg A cyborg ()—a portmanteau of ''cybernetic'' and ''organism''—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline.

enemies using guns (the "machine gun" and the "cannon" can be swapped back and forth) and smart bombs (which wipe out all enemies on screen.) The goal of each stage is to plant all of the bombs and escape before their collective timer goes off.

Reception

In Japan, ''Game Machine'' listed ''Crack Down'' on their May 15, 1989 issue as being the third most popular arcade game during the previous two weeks. Console XS gave a review score of 82%. They praised the detailed graphics and felt the gameplay was very addictive and praised the 2 player mode saying it’s double the fun. They concluded saying it’s worth playing. MegaTech gave the genesis version a review score of 65%. They praised Crack Down saying it’s enjoyable to play and praised the two player mode calling it fun. They criticized the game’s lack of challenge.

References

External links

Official Virtual Console website
* * 1989 video games Amiga games Amstrad CPC games Arcade video games Atari ST games Commodore 64 games Cooperative video games Sega arcade games Sega video games Sega Genesis games U.S. Gold games Video games scored by Yasuhiro Kawakami Virtual Console games ZX Spectrum games Video games developed in Japan {{action-videogame-stub