The Crew

This game is defunct. Do note the game no longer works at all without modifications. This is most likely due to the game's servers being shut down. As a result, further official developments with the game are unlikely to happen.

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page.

This page or section needs more images. There's a whole lotta words here, but not enough pictures. Please fix this. Specifically: Graphics comparison between the original game and Wild Run, as well with the closed beta and initial release.

This page sucks. If you could make it suck less, that would be awesome. Specifically: The Crew has had various betas & far more undocumented/unused areas, cars, textures and other assets that are yet to be featured here, any additional information about these topics is highly suggested to be added.

The Crew focuses on you exploring the very large map with your friends (your crew) in many different types of vehicles divided into 8 specifications (9 if you count Fullstock) like Street, Dirt, Performance, Raid, Circuit, Drift, Monster Truck and Drag.

On December 14, 2023, The Crew, its microtransactions and expansions were delisted on all platforms, with an official announcement that the servers for the game would be shut down on March 31, 2024.

Unused/Unavailable Cars#

Chevrolet Impala Drag Spec#

This car is seen in promotional images, in-game (in the salt flats Drag trial completion menu background) and even for a few seconds in the Wild Run launch trailer, but it cannot be bought or used. The reason for it's not being obtainable is unknown, but could be due to licensing issues or time constraints.

The Drag Spec in-game	The Drag Impala in the Wild Run trailer

RUF CTR-3 XFINITY Edition#

The RUF CTR-3 XFINITY edition was added in an unknown update before the Wild Run expansion released, and was only obtainable from The XFINITY Speed Challenge event that was held on December 17th, 2014 and concluded on January 6th, 2015 (Though, the event continued to be playable past the end date up until March 31st, 2024 when the game was entirely shutdown).

The player on the leaderboard with the fastest time would be rewarded with the RUF CTR-3 XFINITY Edition in-game, and several other real world prizes that included various video games and an undisclosed sum of money. The car isn't shown in the car list for non-owners of this 'unique' CTR-3 with a poorly rebranded appearance with 'XFINITY' slapped on every section of the car's exterior.

Unused RUF CTR-3 XFINITY Edition Liveries#

Its in the title, unused liveries for a car that for some reason has more creative effort put into the design of unused assets only used by the AI racers in the event, then the actual prize car you get for actually being the top time of thousands of people worldwide. The final livery used for the car is featured here as a means of comparison (of how utterly garbage the so called prize car's design is)

Front view of the used final livery	Rear view of the used final livery

Front view of the unused AI livery	Rear view of the unused AI livery
Front view of the alternate unused AI livery	Rear view of the alternate unused AI livery

Mazda MX-5 (ND) Circuit Spec#

The Circuit Spec Mazda MX-5 was added in the Calling All Units expansion. It was only obtainable through a community challenge held by Ubisoft for The Crew's 3 year anniversary that started on December 1st 2017 and concluded on December 7th 2017, where participants simply had to complete "The Initiation" story mission. All participants received the car and the ability to modify it to Circuit Spec.

According to the last person who wrote this section,^{[this info is not in the provided source]} players who did not participate to this event and earn the Circuit Spec MX-5 did not have the ability to modify a MX-5 to Circuit Spec.

Subaru BRZ#

The Subaru BRZ was added in the Wild Run expansion and was available in the Street, Dirt, Perf and Drift specs. On November 27th, 2020, the car was made unobtainable, players who bought it before November 27th can still use it, but are unable to purchase new specs not already owned by the player.

Unused Graphics#

Audi#

An unused Audi logo was left in the game. This, along with some promotional images featuring the Audi TT, suggests that Audi pulled out at some point during development.

Land Rover#

It seems like Land Rover was cut at an early stage of development as none of their cars appear in concept art nor promotional art. The only thing that remains in the game files is their logo.

Lexus#

Lexus was most likely cut from the game at an earlier stage of development as the logo is the only remaining asset referencing the brand in the game files.

Unused Car Icons#

In the game files, there's a set of icons representing different cars. Among them are some that are not present in the final game, including:

• Audi R8
• Audi TT RS
• Giant Truck (likely used for testing purposes)
• Lexus LFA
• Range Rover Sport
• Rocket Car (likely used for testing purposes)

Miscellaneous#

Unused Monster Truck Arena#

There is an unused monster truck arena found in the Wild Run Beta, but it appears to be untextured and only for testing purposes. It can be seen at 14:59 in the video below:

Watch on YouTube

Revisional Differences#

The Crew went through many updates throughout its life cycle, starting from its original beta to its controversial Wild Run expansion that "improved" upon the game's graphics, altered & updated hud and added a huge chunk of content to the game, with the only problem being that it also removed a whole lot of NPCS, traffic cars, completely broke texture materials and texture quality, making lighting function weird at times and lastly, removing large amounts specific details relating to cars and other things as well.

HUD Differences#

Pre-wild run HUD is at the top & post-wild run HUD is shown at the bottom.

Leaderboard HUD Differences#

Pre-Wild Run w/ avatars	Post-Wild Run w/o avatars

Texture Differences#

Pre-Baked Environment Maps#

Detroit Pre-Wild Run	Detroit Post-Wild Run

Broken Traffic Car Materials#

Ice Cream Truck

Broken Interior Window Material#

The interior of windows as of Wild Run seem to share the same broken material problem with the Ice Cream Truck, with world effects clipping through the interior. Though thankfully these issues are not that noticeable in-game unless you're driving in first person view in broad summer daylight.

Rear view of Broken Interior Window Material

Missing PBR Tree Bark Material#

Tree barks have a missing PBR material/colour texture for some reason.

Missing Tree Bark PBR Material

Miscellaneous Oddities#

Flashing Lightpoles#

For some reason, entering the HQ through the in-game phone and leaving causes the light pole's lighting effect to be oversized/oddly scaled for a few seconds

Oddly Scaled Lighting FX

Misplaced Lighting#

The Wild Run update somehow managed to mess up the lighting effect positioning for light poles.

Misplaced Lighting FX

Bleached Effect On Character Appearances#

For some weird reason, most characters seem to have some kind of odd high contract effect on their physical appearance whenever they interact with the player, this strange effect can range from being subtly noticed occasion to being extremely glaring and jarring (Shiv's appearance is an example of the latter).

Shiv's in-game appearance Pre-Wild Run	Shiv's in-game appearance in Wild Run

Removed Traffic Vehicles#

Ford Crown Victoria Variants#

Removed with the Wild Run update.

Black Taxi	Yellow Taxi
Red Taxi	Silver Taxi

Generic Old Traffic Car#

Removed with the Wild Run update.

Black Traffic Car	Silver Traffic Car

Removed Map Models#

Traffic Lights#

Prior to Wild Run, each location had unique traffic lights that corresponded to how they look in the real world. After Wild Run, they were all replaced by a generic traffic light model for all areas.

Chicago	Los Angeles
Detroit	The South
Las Vegas	New York Variant 1
New York Variant 2	New York Variant 3

Removed Details#

Vehicle Headlights#

Perf spec has a high beam, similar to xenon lights beam & raid spec has a longer lighting distance and bigger beam spread. After Wild Run, all specs share the same generic headlight lighting distance and beam spread and no longer have these details.

Perf Spec Headlights	Raid Spec Headlights

Removed License Plate Glow#

License plates used to have a subtle glow. now you can barely make them out in the dark. (Left - Pre-WR, Right - WR)

License Plate (Pre-Wild Run)	License Plate (Wild Run)

Removed Debris Effect#

3D car debris particle effects for collisions were removed with the Wild Run update. (Left - Pre-WR, Right - WR). May or maybe not be related to the game changing from 32-bit to 64-bit and not being reworked to function properly.

Example of Debris effect during collision (Pre-Wild Run)	Example of removed debris effect during collision (Wild Run)

Removed Road Reflections of Cop Lights#

Roads stopped reflecting cop lights with the Wild Run update. (Left - Pre-WR, Right - WR)

Cop lighting road reflection (Pre-Wild Run)	Removed Cop lighting road reflection (Wild Run)

Removed Wild Life & unobtainable "Zoologist" achievement#

"Zoologist" is one of multiple achievements that are completely impossible to complete as multiple animals that are required to spot to unlock the achievement were removed from the game subsequently after Wild Run released, with no adjustments made to achievement process to accommodate the removed content.

Gameplay Differences#

Car Track Width Change#

In the Wild Run update, the "physics" track width was increased on all cars without changing the visual side of things, causing a extensive change in how vehicles would feel and behave in terms of suspension and body roll in normal gameplay. Additionally causing a "ghost wheel" effect where the extended physics wheels would appear to collide with objects much farther than the car.

Additionally, this change may be the reason why cars in cutscenes appear to move in a unstable manner as vehicles are keyframed to a position track, but due to their physical orientation and velocity being unlocked and calculated in real time, causing rather funny "interesting" & "unique" appearances of moving cars in cutscenes.

Illustration of Track Width Change

Invisible barrier at Mountain States Tunnel#

An invisible barrier was added to a presumably miscellaneous Mountain States tunnel in the Wild Run update.

Blocked front tunnel entrance	Blocked rear tunnel entrance

Title Screen Differences#

The Wild Run update included 3 new specifications (Drift, Monster Truck, Drag) and bikes but you had to buy the Wild Run Expansion pack to get access to them while the graphics revision, more specifications support for cars and bug fixes were released for free as an update.

The Calling All Units update added police cars, new police missions, crates that would give you money and random cars/bikes (police or street race), but the police missions and police cars were locked behind an expansion pack also called Calling All Units.

There are also different title screens for each update.

Note: The title screen changes with every major update and doesn't require ownership of the expansion packs.

The Crew Closed Beta	The Crew
The Crew Wild Run	The Crew Calling All Units

Hidden Offline Mode#

There's a flash variable (game uses adobe flash for HUD) called "_root.ProdOnly" (_root meaning global variable), which is always at false/0,however if set to 1 the game will reveal its hidden offline menu, choosing to play online will function as normal but selecting offline won't function due to the game built-in DRM (VMProtect) prohibiting the player from proceeding any further, although the games prologue & partial parts of normal free roam is completely playable offline after logging in online.

Platform Differences#

The Xbox 360 version never got the Wild Run and Calling All Units expansions due to hardware limitations.