Half management sim, half choose your own adventure story game, this game really scratches an itch that I didn't know I had. Unfortunately has low replay value due to the fact that each run will have the same crimes occur at the same times, but well-worth it even if you only get one run out of it. Has some interesting mechanics as well focusing on engaging in active investigations against gangs that you have to topple.

My one complaint (which does make sense for the game) is that there is no way of knowing how many officers you'll need to succeed in stopping a crime. It makes sense thematically with the unpredictable nature of criminals and the danger that is posed to officers when responding to them, but it feels really bad when you lose a super high level officer who you thought could handle one dude.

Finished this game back in 2018 through family share,
had to buy it to support the studio and write a comment.
Currently replaying it, highly recommended.

While the Concept of the Game and Story is quite interesting and refreshing, at the same time it has been overused. Answearing Police Calls and managing your Units makes fun for the first few ingame days, but towards the end it gets you tired. Reducing the amount of played Days would have probably improved my overall Impression of the Game. That way it is now it feels like you play some days just to increase the overall Playtime and not for the Story or for Fun.

What i also really liked is the Soundtrack of the game but it also comes with a caviat. Everyday selecting the song to play gets tiresome if you do it for the 50th time and towards the later half of day the Song is finished. Allowing Players to just select Tracks that would run in a loop would have been a big QoL Improvement.

Gets you depressed. Totally recommended

acab

it is like a good movie - created in your fantasy combined with some strategic aspects. i like this game...

Design behind this game is genial, I definitely got my portion of fun and enjoyment and I do recommend trying it out.

I wouldn't brag much, but I will mention that I got my progress ruined by the game after investing 27 hours into playthrough, just like that without the chance to recover - which to me is devastating and crucial.

Full disclosure, I am absolutely nowhere near done with any of this game. However there are things in place that guarantee I will not be changing my review rating, below I will elaborate on this and more.

So first things first, the game is story oriented and gameplay is not necessarily a backseat, more like a welcome counterpart that spaces out the cutscenes. For what it's worth I actually like what the developers do with the graphics, they never get in the way of enjoying the games semi serious plot, no instead I think they compliment it perfectly.

Secondly, I don't dislike the whole crooked cop narrative.. the idea might not be toyed with enough for other developers to try and flesh it out because it puts the main character in a position where they could end up disliked by even the fans. I give them no shortage of credit for going to the depths they have done with Jack (the MC here) and applaud that he doesn't work on himself per se or try to change for the greater good, it works and serves the purpose.

Now don't get me wrong my complaints are not steeped in gameplay reasons either, personally I enjoy the whole answering calls business and doing it all over again. What I do not have so much fun with is when the game only lets the player reload certain days, oh sure it does a good job of having multiple saves to go back to as you make progress BUT if you make a mistake on a day then you can't always go back just 1 day to fix it.

Look I get it, I'm no stranger to reloading a save after losing hours of progress. Been there done that many times over, my patience does NOT wear thin having to do it all again. I grew up where it wasn't commonplace for games to even have an autosave feature, my skin is pretty thick to that sort of thing.. so no I don't chastise it for that alone.

What's the problem then? The game is also fickle about giving the player a game over, the Mayor in particular has had me arrested twice for not appeasing him and the first time I didn't even get why he was so upset. That led me to going back to an earlier save about a week prior, starting a full investigation and solving 3 SEEMINGLY OPTIONAL investigations... just so that I could have the stupid Mayor praise me for a job well done and not fudge my save.

Oh but he's not the only one doing that, you get in thick with mafias and some important names in the game. They appear early on and persist, probably being replaced down the line to keep the plot thickening I bet. Not a problem, just that now you have to make sure you're balancing a turf war from day 13, making sure you don't let either leader fall behind in score for 3 days straight otherwise you get a game over.

I wrote this review after being shot dead on day 21. My latest save up to this point is also day 21, loading it just shows the cutscene of me dying. Where does that leave me? Back on day 15, that translates to half hour of playing just to get back where I was previously and then if I haven't forgot to keep the turf war balanced I can progress.

No I don't recommend This is the Police, along with the above issues it also promotes a false sense of freedom. You'd think that you can ignore the Mayor and make it up to him with favors, or do similar with other names (most important names will ask favors semi regularly in my experience) but then you don't do 2 of his decrees and he ends you. There's nothing in here to make you feel like chief of the police, there is however plenty of content to give the illusion that you have the power in this game, then as you get comfortable it will sharply snap you out of it.

There is a non zero chance of me returning to the review to fill it with content pertaining to the game. On the other hand there is also zero chance of me returning to this with the intent of changing the review to a positive.

Did I mention I play with a guide for certain things now? Not because I want or need help, I just want to potentially avoid being kicked in the balls by something like a monk entering my police station and making my staff resign from their violent ways.

Great soundtrack, interesting concept and characters, but the pacing....oof. Starts okay but the later you get the worse it gets, the gameplay loop starts getting terribly repetitive and the story also leaves some of its promises behind. Still a good game, but the concept is not as well executed as it could. Some mechanics are nice but not explored (or put better, you're not forced to do anything out of the ordinary to keep going), 7/10 if I'd give it a score. Nevertheless, a solid concept and atmosphere, with a good presentation. I also can't leave out the humor, which I particularly like.

By far one of the most unique games I have ever played. Can't think of many other games where instead of getting involved with the action you sit back and watch others do it under your command, while you focus on paperwork. The style and presentation are all very well done, but the pacing is where the game starts to trip over itself. By the end of the game, you will have seen the same cases and crimes repeatedly with little to no new ones popping up. So, instead of carefully reading the paperwork and using your best judgment to decide how you want to handle this, you just send out whoever you have on standby. There are sometimes game modifiers that change the way you need to play or add a new element to the formula, but even with these in play, I was waiting for the game to end by the start of Act 3. It's fun for the first half, but it definitely over stays it's welcome. (7/10).