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The Crookz is styled all like the 70s. Hair is growing wild and the colours are, too. And I'm a 70s child, I was eager to try it.

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As a small group of thieves, we're supposed to plan and commit crimes. After a thorough tutorial introducing the game mechanics and telling the preface of the story, we start with two people to do our first burglary. Later on, more people will join the crew and we can buy additional resources (like cholorform or a crowbar). Everyone in the crew is specialized. In the tutorial, we got a runner, an engineer, a contortionist and a locksmith.

We are planning the way of every crew member, when to turn which switch, open which door, drug which guard, wait for something, or whatever. We see the guards' ways as well as their viewing range. Some actions will create noise or otherwise attract attention. The range for those is shown as well. The game can and should be paused often to plan your next step - especially when the last one didn't turn out like it should have. Altogether, this reminded me of the old (was it back in the 70s as well? ;) ) game Desperados.

The heists are presented from above, looking into 70s beauty of different environments. The camera is zoomable and freely turnable. Music is laid-back. The Crookz is using the Unreal Engine and I did not run into any problems. It is due on Aug, 25, but there's already a demo available, which was the version I've played. So I'm sure we can expect a day 1 release for Linux.

Official info:
It’s the 1970’s: the era of Funk, flared jeans and disco-fueled Saturday nights. A crack team of expert thieves turn Grand Larceny into an art-form by using their many talents to break into the richest homes and steal the finest jewelry - all to finance their hedonistic lifestyles. That is until a lucrative museum heist in Venice involving a famous gem known as ‘Luna Stone’ ends in betrayal and the team broken apart. Five years later the remaining gang members reunite with a plot for revenge against their traitorous former comrade – but naturally, their plan will also make them rich beyond their wildest dreams…

Crookz - The Big Heist is a tactical strategy game set in the funky 1970’s with a slick and groovy atmosphere. Show off the art of thieving by plotting stylish heists and robberies; utilizing espionage and quick-thinking to avoid detection. Implement a successful strategy by assembling and kitting out your team before the job and planning the best way in.

Links:
* Homepage
* Steam page, with demo Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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19 comments

Keyrock Aug 16, 2015
You get to play as a foxy black woman with an afro! I'm definitely down to try the demo now.
flesk Aug 16, 2015
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Looks very cool. Will definitely give the demo a shot.
fizzgig Aug 16, 2015
Little mistake in the article. The game is based on the Unreal Engine.

Looks like a good one. Tried the demo on my Steam Machine. Controller support works good. :)
Eike Aug 16, 2015
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Little mistake in the article. The game is based on the Unreal Engine.

You're rotally right. Wrote it on my sheet and then entered the wrong name here. :-/
Liam, would you? (Is there a possibility I could edit my own articles?)
Liam Dawe Aug 16, 2015
Little mistake in the article. The game is based on the Unreal Engine.

You're rotally right. Wrote it on my sheet and then entered the wrong name here. :-/
Liam, would you? (Is there a possibility I could edit my own articles?)

Fixed it. Editing is generally left for people of editor status, so random submissions from anyone can't get messed up too much (if that makes sense?).
d10sfan Aug 16, 2015
Demo didn't run very well on my system, was getting a constant 16 fps, which was odd, and it made even the menus hard to navigate.
Eike Aug 16, 2015
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Demo didn't run very well on my system, was getting a constant 16 fps, which was odd, and it made even the menus hard to navigate.

I had around 60 (Intel quad core, Nvidia GTX 660 - driver 352.21, 8 GB, 1680*1050) with the medium video profile chosen by the game.


Last edited by Eike on 16 August 2015 at 5:30 pm UTC
Eike Aug 16, 2015
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Fixed it. Editing is generally left for people of editor status, so random submissions from anyone can't get messed up too much (if that makes sense?).

Thanks for fixing it. It's probably reasonable to have editing rights not spread too wide.
JSVRamirez Aug 16, 2015
My EnhancedSteam puts a banner on the game's page saying;
"Warning: This title uses 3rd party DRM"

Can anyone give some more detail about this?
LinuxGamesTV Aug 16, 2015
My EnhancedSteam puts a banner on the game's page saying;
"Warning: This title uses 3rd party DRM"

Can anyone give some more detail about this?

It mean Steam i think.


Last edited by LinuxGamesTV on 16 August 2015 at 6:51 pm UTC
Eike Aug 16, 2015
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My EnhancedSteam puts a banner on the game's page saying;
"Warning: This title uses 3rd party DRM"

Can anyone give some more detail about this?

My Not-so-enhanced-Steam says "3rd party DRM: Kalypso Launcher (Account registration optional)"
Keyrock Aug 16, 2015
I played the demo on my beastly overpriced machine (i7-4790K Titan X), runs like a champ fully maxed at 1440p, easily keeping a V-Synced 60 FPS. I like the game a lot, the interface is really elegant and user friendly. You can set as many waypoints as you like, queue up commands at individual waypoints, and even delete individual waypoints and the game will connect the remaining waypoints for you (or you can delete all waypoints at once and start over). I haven't tried it with my 360 pad yet because this type of game screams m&kb to me, but I'm glad that it sounds like controller works fine. It's quite likely I'll pick this game up as tactical stealth games are right up my alley.


Last edited by Keyrock on 16 August 2015 at 6:56 pm UTC
WienerWuerstel Aug 16, 2015
No, it means the Kalypso Launcher which wasn't even used in the OS X and GNU/Linux Version of Tropico 5. So we can hope that Crookz doesn't need it either, at least not on OS X and GNU/Linux.
Eike Aug 16, 2015
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As for 3rd Party DRM, it's probably Steamworks. All recent Kalypso titles seem to use it.

That wouldn't be third party from Steam's view.
Keyrock Aug 16, 2015
As for 3rd Party DRM, it's probably Steamworks. All recent Kalypso titles seem to use it.

That wouldn't be third party from Steam's view.
Okay, well I didn't notice anything else, at least not in the demo. I didn't have to register a Kalypso account or anything.
JSVRamirez Aug 16, 2015
My EnhancedSteam puts a banner on the game's page saying;
"Warning: This title uses 3rd party DRM"

Can anyone give some more detail about this?

My Not-so-enhanced-Steam says "3rd party DRM: Kalypso Launcher (Account registration optional)"

No, it means the Kalypso Launcher which wasn't even used in the OS X and GNU/Linux Version of Tropico 5. So we can hope that Crookz doesn't need it either, at least not on OS X and GNU/Linux.

Excellent, thanks.
Keyrock Aug 16, 2015
I finished the demo, it's the tutorial and the first 3 heists, about an hour and a half of gameplay, which is more than fair for a demo IMHO. It's plenty long enough to get a good feel for the game, anyhow. I had the game CTD once on me during that time. Impressively, when I reloaded and picked "Continue" it started me about 5 seconds before the CTD, so the game must autosave fairly often (you can manually save at any time too). Beyond that it was buttery smooth sailing for the nearly 2 hours I spent with the game. In the tutorial mission gondolas had weird outlines, but I'm not sure if that was by design or a graphical glitch. It's the only thing that was possibly a graphical glitch that I saw, everything else rendered just fine.

I think I'm going to pre-order this. I know, I know, pre-order bad, I share that sentiment, but this isn't a case where I'm pre-ordering blind, I'm more informed than had I seen reviews, I've actually played the game and I know for a fact that it exists on Linux, runs well on my particular hardware configuration, and is a game I definitely want to play more.
Eike Aug 17, 2015
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It's the only thing that was possibly a graphical glitch that I saw, everything else rendered just fine.

I could, at least in the tutorial, not make out where the camera is looking, but I blamed my stupidity. Do you see camera line of sight?

I think I'm going to pre-order this. I know, I know, pre-order bad, I share that sentiment, but this isn't a case where I'm pre-ordering blind, I'm more informed than had I seen reviews, I've actually played the game and I know for a fact that it exists on Linux, runs well on my particular hardware configuration, and is a game I definitely want to play more.

I did the same for Talos Principle; Due to the demo, I was sure it's working, support is good and the game would be fun.


Last edited by Eike on 17 August 2015 at 7:14 pm UTC
d10sfan Aug 17, 2015
Figured out my problem with the framerate, vsync to blank was enabled in settings for some reason (I disabled it earlier). Now, it works great.
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