The player character arrives in Crime City and is directed toward Crank Marshall — an old contact whose local operations provide the opening run of missions: learning to drive, eliminating a nephew who quit the organization, stealing cars, clearing out former employees. Marshall then connects the player to Inspector Barnes, a police officer who is deep enough into the criminal ecosystem to make full use of freelance help. Barnes assigns escalating jobs — drug recovery, targeted killings, gang suppression. Alongside this, a woman named Shug from the Viperz gang draws the player into a third set of obligations. The three power centers — Marshall, Barnes, and the Viperz — each pull in their own direction as Crime City's tensions build.