Truly a Diamond in the Rough..
Lets start with all of the good..
1.) Open world environment: Think Grand Theft Auto 3 in Hong Kong. The game developers did a great job making Hong Kong come to life. The AI is fairly active and random conversations are never too far to be found. The city is expansive with tons of accessible buildings. There are essentially 3 main islands that are also accessible from the very beginning of the game.
2.) Fighting: This is what makes this game shine. The amount of moves that you learn by the end of the game is pretty substantial and the ease of executing them is amazing. There are a few combos that can be difficult to execute at first,but if done correctly will reward you with a pretty satisfying cinematic experience.
3.) Storyline: Unlike some games that have awesome gameplay but an absolutely dreadful storyline (Just Cause 2), this game has both. The storyline becomes very personal towards the middle of the game and sympathy for game characters emerges quite well. There were definitely a handful of times in the game where I was left with my mouth wide open and the screen fading to black. Also, the missions never got to that boring point of repetition that I find in a lot of open world games. Go here. Blow up this and escape. Rinse and repeat. This game doesn't ever get that way.
4.) Longevity: Like stated above, i probably spent between 30-40 hrs of solid gameplay (including finding all of the "extras"). To me that worth the 30 bucks or so I paid for this game. So this is not a renter. Just buy it.
5.) Controls: This is includes controls for the character himself while walking and running, and the vehicle controls. All are good. The vehicles especially have that "weighted" feel to them as a real car or truck has. You cannot just turn on a dime while driving 70mph. Although, drifting with e-brake is pretty awesome at those speeds haha.
Now the bad..
1.) Graphics: Truthfully the only thing I think should have been better. And it's not that they're terrible, don't get me wrong. But they have this overexposed look to them that to me just doesn't fit the undercover cop/bad guy good guy essence of the game. But after playing for awhile, it's easy to overlook this and a few other small quirks (not naming any of the vehicles for one..) and find a truly awesome, and somewhat media-neglected game
2.) Weapons: There are basically no weapons in this game. I think there is a pistol, a shotgun, and a machine gun. And good luck finding any of them. They give you a pistol with about 20 bullets after a couple missions. The shotgun can be found in the backs of police cars after like 20 hrs into the game. And the machine/uzi is sporadically given to you after a couple car chase missions. So, forget using a gun, and learn to kick some ass with all of you moves.
All in all, this game is worth the 20-30 bucks you would pay for it now. Be ready for tons of action (car chases, foot chases, awesome martial arts, deep storyline, and an expansive sandbox version of Hong Kong).