The Hustle: Detroit Streets

It begins with Kat’s Story, images that run one into the next showing violence, and the occasional pool table. Flash forward and right into Jack’s storyline. Kat is left behind – for the moment.

Kat Stone is an undercover cop, on the trail of a real bad dude who has a penchant for not getting directly involved in all his dirty dealings. Jack wanders into her life, a man who is different from most men, in Kat’s words, “he’s actually useful.”

Jack has been run out of Philly, beaten up, lost all his dough but he still manages to look like “he is on top of the world.” And coincidentally, when it comes to actually playing, he has some money at the game’s start.

It you think The Hustle: Detroit Streets is only about playing pool, and going online against human competitions, think again. This is a title that blends criminals, set-ups and the game of pool. You had best bring your “A” game to these tables, because controls take some getting used to before you may find yourself running the table. 

Activision and Blade Interactive are behind the Xbox title of The Hustle: Detroit Streets, a title that blends a story-driven plot rife with violence into the world of pool sharks, hustling for a buck or two while working toward solving some of the crimes and getting retribution on the perpetrators.

The game sports two modes of play – story mode and online multiplayer.

Of course, to play the game you have to understand how to control the pool stick, angle your shots and adjust your power. Easier said than done. The game has an overriding influence, known as ‘intimidation.’ Make a tough shot and the meter swings to your favor. Blow an easy shot and the spectator mocking rises, and your meter reflects your lack of ability.

Just as in the real world, you have to think a shot or two ahead. This is not just a matter of lining up the shot and pushing a power button for the force behind it. You have to consider the spin on the cue ball, the angle, and use the left thumbstick to line it up. Then you have to use the right thumbstick to adjust the force of the shot. But that’s not all. After you set all that up – and you can use a trigger to help fine-tune the angles – then you have to hit the A button, nail the moving zone on the target meter to actually try to incorporate everything you set up. Is real pool this hard? Not by a long shot.

However, there is a way to use the left trigger to slow the thumbstick aiming and the Y will give you an overhead shot to help line up your angles better.

You may 'begin' with Kat’s story, but the story mode actually starts off with Jack, in a pool room, playing 9-ball against the local characters. You can play for money per rack or per ball. From Russ and 9-ball, you graduate to Mike and Snooker. Mike’s skills apparently bite, until it comes time for the money ball, and then his skills sparkle. Bad AI or are you being hustled? Likely the latter. And each pool room has a variety of characters that you have to play against and beat to get to the boss to continue the story line.

The animation is decent, but the audio – at least in this preview build – needs work. It is repetitive and can become annoying, when it comes to the narrative/voice-overs. The music, when it does pop in, is solid.

If that woman’s sarcastic phrase “are you holding the right end of the stick” replays one more time, it may have causative reverberations in demonstrating other uses for a pool cue. Then there is stoner boy’s voice cracking as he yells “what are you doing?” … or heckling dude who hollers “get some glasses” … or the swearing that seems to capture what a player may actually be feeling at a given time.

The controls, depending on your intimidation factor, can start to feel really sloppy and it is harder to have touch on the cue stick. Generally, though, the game is not overly hard to control.

The Hustle: Detroit Streets is not a bad looking game and once the learning curve of setting up and making shots is overcome, the pool is rather good. The online mode promises to have some solid entertainment value and the story mode gives the game some added depth. But there is some linearity here that can be frustrating. There is a wide selection of pool games though, and decent challenges along the way.