As a game company, Ubisoft has a mixed reputation. It produces some amazing games, such as the Assassin’s Creed series, but is also plagued with quality and reliability issues. The Crew, Ubisoft’s new release, seeks to change all that.

The Crew is an online driving game that mixes Need for Speed with The Fast and The Furious. The premise is that you’re an ace driver who needs to infiltrate a gang of other drivers. To do this, your character Alex Taylor has to race across a mostly authentic map of the US to get close to the gang.

Dubious plotline aside, the game looks fantastic. It’s fast, colourful, well modelled and moves smoothly. After a bumpy launch, the online issues have been mostly resolved, making for a good play experience.

The Crew is an online game, which means that it’s populated by hundreds of other players. You can play solo, team up or just drive around: it’s completely up to you. To progress you need to complete a series of missions spread across the country. Some of those missions can literally last for hours, so the investment in time results in investment in your character.

The missions are varied and always fast. The action is definitely arcade mode, but in a good way. Teaming up with friends is a great way to collaborate and complete the missions.

There are downsides to The Crew. You have to be always online and you can’t really play much of the game solo. You’re forced to team up, so if the members of your crew aren’t online, you’re a little stuck for things to do. You can still drive around and complete a few basic missions but you cannot achieve anything meaningful.

Despite the downsides, The Crew is an excellent game that offers hours of fun. As long as you keep the same kind of hours as your friends and don’t mind being forced to play with them, it’s a great buy.

Jesmond Darmanin is a technology enthusiast who has his own blog at www.itnewsblog.com.