6. Tell One Hell Of A Story
What do you remember about GTA V's story? Most people play the series to indulge in the overly anarchic custom set-pieces you can put in motion; from overblown cop chases to launching sports cars in all manner of directions - it's clear that although IV tried to tell a very weighty and consequential tale about 'life in the big city' from a foreign perspective, it didn't sit very well with the series' chaos-loving demographic. V had Trevor bring that back in abundance, but it lost all relatability in the process; we had no heroes to champion, no villains to lament - nothing worth getting invested in to see through to the end. Instead it was a sea of grey with a bunch of random things peppered throughout for the sake of it - even moving containers on a dock for the sake of character interaction. Not the best. Sleeping Dogs instead went for the tried n' true 'undercover cop' approach - something that's bore fruit everywhere from Point Break to The Fast and the Furious; and it worked a treat. You had the perfect mix of higher-up officials knowing what you were up to, whilst the cops and gang members on the street were none the wiser. You met up with some great characters caught up in the whole thing for a variety of reasons, and as you personally tried to balance the morality of being a cop whilst slowly understanding why the criminals did what they did, on-screen Wei was saying exactly what you were thinking. Sure the whole thing 'just another action plot', but occasionally that's exactly what's needed.