As someone who purchased Crackdown for H3 Beta and had mediocre expectations after reading Gamespot's review...I really like it. So far I have killed three gang bosses, but spent the majority of my time collecting orbs and working on skills. Working on your skills is Oblivion-style addictive, at least until the 2-star level. After 2 stars (4 stars max) the leveling is faaaaaaaar more difficult, but my drive is still there to level up. So far I'm just short of 100/500 agility orbs.

I also like collecting different enemy weapons and storing them at my supply points (after which you can choose them whenever you spawn or visit a supply point). The sniper rifle is really fun, as is the shotgun. Finding the hidden orbs is extra fun because they give you a random skills boost to all of your abilities.

After 2 stars jumping from building to building is a lot of fun. Climbing the ferris wheel is a lot of fun. I also like the fact that the achievements are broad in scope and ability. You unlock a few achievements for the first time you complete simple tasks, which motivates you to play early on. You also get ability upgrades to one star rather early, motivating you to keep going. Some achievements will take 30+ hours to unlock (4 stars in each ability). There's just an immense amount of content to explore and many ways to play the game.

After about 3 hours with the game I can say for sure that this will be worth my $60.

I guess it's a hit.

From what I've read on editorials, Crackdown has received "meh" ratings. Like 7/10.

Since I didn't pre-order for the Halo 3 Beta, I guess this means I'm screwed.

I know people that are walking into Best Buy's and Wal-Mart's are finding Crackdown with the H3 beta.

I just bought it like thirty minutes ago as of this post.

When I picked up my copy from EB, the guy said "Yeah, I think we have some..." and then opened a cabinet that had a huge stack of crackdown copies! I don't know if they had Halo 3 Beta invitations, but I don't have any reason to believe otherwise. There were others there talking about the game with the guys behind the counter, asking about the Beta program. The guys working there acted like all their copies had beta invites, they didn't say anything about having to preorder.
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I am unenthused with the multiplayer functionality.
1) If someone joins my game it has to respawn us both (whatever I'm going has to stop). No GoW style anytime in/out.
2) Your co-op partner must be at a similar point in the game and in his abilities for co-op to make a lot of sense. If you join the game of someone with more of the game complete (more bosses killed than you) then those missions aren't available for you.
3) Just a one-star difference in agility can make common things like roofjumping and climbing The Keep much more difficult for the lesser developed character.

On a positive note, collecting orbs is still a lot of fun with two people. I think my main focus of co-op in the future is going to be exploring the world for orbs.

Campaign is still a blast. Can't get enough.

What happens if your co-op partner leaves the game? Does the game end, like it does in Gears of War, or do you respawn again?

The game is a mixed bag. The open world, explore everywhere, do anything part of Crackdown is extremely fun. Create a traffic accident on a bridge and watch cars fly all over the place. Drive the Supercar under oncoming traffic, or the Supercab through oncoming traffic. Jump and flip the SUV. Reverse the ramp truck towards on coming traffic. HAH fun.

Plus collecting orbs is extremely fun. I'd enjoy a game of just this.

On the other hand, the single player campaign is really dull. The story is: well what story. The thoughts pointless and stupid come to mind. Although I felt this way with most games, GoW for instance. In Crackdown, I would immediately click off any videos popping up.

The point of the game is to essentially kill bosses. Which has its bright spots. But overall the battles are easy, repetitive, and really not fun. I'd would just simply run really quick, ignore all the guards(which seemed to respawn endlessly), and kill the boss using rockets and leave. Screw the order in which you kill bosses, or the probability ratio. It is easy a long as you have at least 2 or 3 agility stars.

Although, I make it sound bad. The single player for all its issues wasn't to bad. It had no what I call memory monsters. Which is my big pet peeve. Which I hate and the reason I disliked GoW's singleplayer, large parts of H2(jackal snipers, taturus, prophet of truth of whatever), or all of Rainbow Six. Memory monsters are special bosses which can only be killed in XYZ way, or when a monster or terrorist will kill you every time until you remember the exact location they are at.

You know the whole hit him in the arm pit, and when he flinches shot in the knee once, then shot him in the little red spot on his back when he turns around, and then he'll go into XYZ animation and is vulnerable. Memory monsters require no tactics or skill. Done my rant.