Alex that's true, the reviews are middling on metacritic but unfortunately it's near impossible to separate the press from the mob at times, in gaming especially. They frequent the same forums and get swept up in the same echo chamber.
No question it's a marmite game, and no question the multiplayer seems like a messy result of their early attempt to sell the cloud, but from what I've seen if you loved crackdown then you'll like this campaign.
I watched a fairly negative ign review yesterday which seemed to boil down to "I don't like crackdown in general, I wish this was another game".
I think that's the problem. Is finding where people who like crackdown stand on this one.
Even digital foundry are countering the idea that it looks bad and saying that it's a good genuine sequel to the original.
So I think the story is more complex, but I think the mob will and are already dictating the ending.