Skills

Agility

Agility is increased in a different manner than the other skills. Instead of being increased by use, its primary method of advancement is found by jumping around the city and finding the glowing green Agility Orbs that are scattered around, usually on rooftops. When you pop an Agility Orb by running through it, it'll release its chocolatey goodness. Collecting enough to reach 100 percent of the required amount for the next level will bump you up, allowing you to jump farther and higher as well as run faster. You start out the game being able to jump around 10 feet or so, but by the time you reach rank four in Agility, you'll be able to leap around 30 feet and will be as speedy as any track star.

Find these little green orbs to increase your agility.

Getting to the first level of Agility will require around five or 10 Orbs, and from there, you can expect skill-ups at around 50, 150, and 250-300 Orbs. You can't really predict when you're going to skill up, because of the fact that different Orbs are worth varying amounts of skill. Orbs that are low to the ground and easy to reach will typically have one smaller orb atop them and will only be worth a small amount of skill to you, while Orbs that are more difficult to reach will have two, three, or four small orbs atop them, and will appear taller when you view them. These harder-to-reach Orbs will net you more skill advancement when you reach them.

In addition to picking up Orbs, you can also increase your Agility by completing the green running races that are scattered around town. You also earn very small amounts of Agility when you shoot or otherwise kill enemies while standing on a surface much higher than they are. Try sniping enemies from a buildingtop to earn these rewards — they're quite tiny, though. Since there are 500 Orbs scattered around Pacific City, though, you won't have to perform either of these activities to earn level four Agility.

Driving

Driving is arguably the least important skill in Crackdown, since you can easily beat the entire game without setting foot in a vehicle. It controls how well your vehicles handle. Higher levels of this skill will allow you to turn more sharply and control the vehicle when you're in midair, and will also unlock new abilities for the Agency cars (which you can requisition from the garage in the Agency basement). When you max out your driving skill, you'll be able to perform jumps with the SUV, fire guns from the front of the Supercar, and perform a charge attack with the truck cab.

The primary method of increasing the driving skill is to hit enemies with your car while you're driving. This can be tricky, though, as your foes will continually dodge your movements in a car, making them difficult to hit. If you intend to increase your driving skill beyond a couple of levels, it's best to spawn at the Agency supply point, grab the Agency SUV, and use that to run around mowing people down. The SUV can take a lot more damage than most vehicles will be able to, and will usually right itself if it happens to roll. It also has a tighter turning radius, making it easier to run people down.

It can be difficult to use normal cars to run down fools. The Agency SUV is your best bet.

In addition to running people down, you can increase your driving skill by completing the races scattered around the island. These are shown on your HUD as large purple beams of light. There are usually fast cars scattered around near these start points, so grab one and head into the light! Completing the race will net you a goodly amount of driving skill points. Note that a lot of these races will have you crossing pedestrian zones; you can lose driving skill by running down civilians, so do your best to avoid them!

You can also raise your skill by hitting air with your car and hitting one of the purple rings that are suspended in precarious positions around the city. You can see an example of these rings by leaving the Agency garage and taking one of the tubes to any part of the city from there. There are 39 rings around the city, but they're only visible if you're in a vehicle.

Lastly, you will get a very small amount of driving skill points by getting into a car and getting a large amount of hangtime after hitting a jump and before hitting the ground.

Explosives

This one’s pretty simple. All you need to do to increase your explosives skill is to kill the bad guys with your explosive weapons, which includes grenades and various grenade and rocket launchers. Shoot them at bad people, kill them, and reap the whirlwind!

BAM!

Early on, increasing your explosives skill will be difficult, as your grenades initially do a puny amount of damage in a very small radius, not to mention the fact that most enemies will run away from them when they land. It’s when you grab a grenade or rocket launcher that you begin to really start pumping out the kills and upping your explosives factor.

As your explosives skill rises, the damage that your explosive weapons do, and the radius of the explosions they cause, will both increase.

Strength

Strength determines the power of your physical attacks, as well as the amount of health that you possess. Initially, you start out with only very weak physical attacks, but over time, as you exercise your muscles, your kicks will eventually become forceful enough to knock your enemies off of buildings or flip cars over, not to mention that they’ll often become one-hit kills when you max out your strength.

Strength also determines your amount of health. You start out with a single health meter, but as you increase your strength, you’ll begin earning more double, triple, or eventually five times the amount of your starting health.

Your strength also determines your ability to pick up items and throw them at your enemies. Initially you won’t be able to pick up much more than a trash can, but eventually you’ll be able to lift cars and other large objects. Killing enemies with thrown objects increases your strength score, but it’s not very practical unless you’re playing on the easiest difficult setting; the time it takes to pick up something and throw it will usually leave you exposed to enemy fire and getting shot up, and many enemies are capable of dodging thrown items unless you’re up close and personal.

Firearms

Shoot people! As you use your weapons to shoot people up, you’ll gain firearms skill points. It skills up fairly slowly, but as you gain new levels, you'll be able to lock onto enemies more quickly and presumably deal more damage with firearms. Note that if you shoot explosive barrels or the like, and enemies die as a result of the explosion, you still earn firearms skill points.