Grand Theft Auto IV

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Grand Theft Auto IV
Tweet Topic Started: May 17 2008, 01:51 PM (342 Views)
LK	May 17 2008, 01:51 PM Post #1
iminspace Posts: 18,081 Group: Active Ancients Member #794 Joined: July 28, 2005 Gender Male Coins 5	Grand Theft Auto IV Developer: Rockstar North Publisher: Rockstar Games Release Date: April 29th, 2008 Genre: Action Adventure Platform: Playstation 3/Xbox 360 Rating: M - Mature Microsoft had its giant year in 2004. They had the top 3 selling games on the platform: Madden NFL 2005, Halo 2, and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. For someone who owned an Xbox that year had a lot to do, because not only were the three monsters high sellers, but they were also great games. 2007, 3 years later, Halo 3 and Madden NFL 08 showed to play once again, and Grand Theft Auto IV was supposed to show its face as well, but failed to release in 2008. So Microsoft’s plan to have the monster year like 2004 was ruined. So now, Grand Theft Auto IV finally made its release in 2008, only four months in, and since then, it has sold millions and millions of copies. Not only has the game sold ridiculously well, it has as been considered by many to be “one of the best games ever”, and even, “the best game of all time” by many media outlets. But the real question is: is Grand Theft Auto IV really one of the best games ever, or is it just over-hyped? Well, let’s find out. If you like deep and crazy stories about mobsters and the Russian Mafia, then you will love GTA IV’s story. Not only is it full of twists and turns, but it’s also pretty epic, not seen in previous GTA games. You start the game as Niko Bellic, a Serbian Immigrant coming to America to finally escape from the terrors of the Bosnian War. His cousin, Roman Bellic, was the man that told Niko that living in America is a dream come true. But what Niko then find out, is that Roman was not exactly telling the truth, because instead of having a mansion, he has a cockroach invested apartment, and instead of having a nice car, he has a crappy piece of junk. The story progresses just like every other past GTA games: Roman introduces you to someone, then you start doing missions for them just to make money, and it continues like that right up to the end of the game. Missions can also randomly appear. You’ll be consistently doing someone’s missions, then a random letter will appear on the map. You go there, only to get introduced to another person you have to try and remember. Most of the missions in GTA IV are not that fun, and they get disappointingly repetitive. Most of mission will be like, “hey, I need you to go kill this dude in Alderney please Niko!” “As long as it pays, sure.” or “Get to Alderney and kill blah blah blah before this and this happens.” It pretty much goes on like that through the whole game. Most of the time, the target will flee and you’ll have to chase the guy through the city. I can’t even keep track how many times you have to chase someone. There are some great missions like Four Leaf Clover though, where you have to rob a bank and escape from the cops. There is not enough variety in the missions however, making you want to complete the last missions quicker and quicker so you can just get it done already. If you have played any of the 3D, or even some of the 2D Grand Theft Auto games before, you’ll feel right at home with GTA IV. Mission structures, funny characters, fast (and slow) cars, bikes, giant cities, great dialog, amazing cut-scene animation and pretty much anything else from previous GTA games are here in GTA IV. There isn’t really anything groundbreaking in Grand Theft Auto IV if that’s what you were looking for, the only thing that will most likely wow you is the city itself. The setting of Grand Theft Auto IV is what you come to expect from a numeric GTA game: Liberty City. Past Liberty Cities never actually felt like you were in New York City, but in GTA IV, you actually feel like you’re driving down the streets of NYC. Everything from the Statue of Liberty, to Central Park, to the Empire State Building are all here. It even goes a little bit farther and adds New Jersey to the mix as well, making it pretty much the same as New York. Don’t go and think that the city looks absolutely identical, because it’s not. Brooker (Brooklyn), Dukes (Queens), and Bohan (The Bronx), are all tiny, and they’re also missing all of Staten Island in its entirety. But even just stopping and looking around is incredible, as stupid as it might sound. Just go to Times Square, stop in the middle of it, and just look at the incredible detail in the buildings, and what the people do on the street, and you’ll just be amazed. People, for example, will get hit with a car, then exit the car, and kick the other person’s ass because they ruined their car. You can also see people in their cars using their cell phones, adjusting their rear view mirror, and sometimes looking at it when people pull up behind them. People on the street are pretty cool too, some may be talking on their cell phones, saying things like, “hey babe, I’ll be home soon” and stuff like that. Hitting people in GTA IV (as sick as it sounds) is a lot more satisfying than in past GTA games too, with an all new physics system implemented in GTA IV. In Vice City and San Andreas for example, when you hit someone, they would fly in the air incredibly unrealistically, then get up and run away. In GTA IV, people will slam into your wind shield, flip over your car, slam against the ground, slowly get up and walk for around 2 seconds, then fall to the ground and die of pain. Pedestrians can also die from car crashes. If you’re driving incredibly fast, then slam into someone from behind, all you will here in a horn that wont stop. And then when you look at the car you hit, the person will be dead against the steering wheel. Insane. Niko can also get seriously hurt from crashes though. If you’re driving quick, and you hit someone head-on, Niko will fly out of the wind shield and slam into other items like poles and cars. Bikes are a lot harder to drive with in GTA IV too, so don’t think that driving incredibly fast down a stretch of road will be safe, because even if you get nicked, Niko will fly into the air, only to hit the ground and taking off a massive amount of health. If you have at least half of your health missing, Niko can very well die from a car crash. This also makes some of the missions more difficult. Some mission you’ll have to drive a motorcycle really fast, and just nicking something will make you soar into the air. GTA IV seems to lack a sense of speed however. Even if you driving down the longest road, with the fastest car, at top speed, you still wont get that, “oh god, if I slip just a little, I’m going to die.”-kind of feeling. In San Andreas for example, everything around you would become somewhat of a blur when you started to drive really fast, but in GTA IV, nothing close to that happens. Crashing cars seem to be a lot more fun GTA IV though, because cars bend and break very realistically, so you may not even want to drive fast in the first place. Even if you just slowly back into a car, your car will have scratches and marks on it. Hoods still fly off after minimal damage still though, which is disappointing, because I hate driving without one, it just feels, dirty. Speaking of dirty, your car in GTA IV can get messy. If you were driving in dirt, or driving in sand or something, or car will be muddy. What you can do is take it to a car wash, and it will shine it up real nice for you. But, usually your car doesn’t just get dirty, and not smashed, so you probably just end up going to the classic pay and spray that will fix your car up, and clean it at the same time. There seems to be a lot less vehicles this time around too. You have your standard amount of cars, but there seems to only be 5 different bikes, and maybe 3 boats, then a couple of helicopters, and that’s it. In San Andreas, there was tons of different kinds of cars, bikes, boats, helicopters, and even planes which you can’t drive in Liberty City because of how small the area is compared to San Andreas. The amount of vehicles doesn’t make the game worse, which it definitely doesn’t, but just comparing San Andreas to IV, it’s just disappointing. Combat however (excluded melee combat) has been giving a facelift, and is a lot better this time around. You press the Left Trigger (L2) in to Aim at a target, then press the Right Trigger (R2) to shoot the weapon you have equipped. Niko automatically auto-aims when you press it down all of the way, but when you gently hold it, he manually aims. This can get annoying when you want to aim at someone in a vehicle, Niko will aim at someone walking down the street, and it can sometimes be a cop. Niko can also use cover in GTA IV by pressing the Right Bumper (L1). Like Gears of War, Niko will stick against the object you’re near like a wall, or a car, and you manually aim from there, and pick off targets one by one. It does feel “sticky” like Gears of War, and the only way to get off is by walking in the opposite direction, or pressing the LB button again. The cover system can get very tedious though, because sometimes you’ll want take cover against the back of a car, but Niko will sometimes walk around to the side of it, and take cover there while you’re getting pelted with bullets. This doesn’t happen too much, but it can happen, and when it does, it’s irritating. You can also zoom your aim in by pressing in the right analog stick. The better weapon you have, the more you can zoom in. The only exception to this is the Sniper Rifle, which you hold the Left Trigger (L2) to look through the scope, then you can zoom in the left analog stick. Shooting the rifle is again done with the Right Trigger (R2). Hand to hand combat is a giant drag though. It’s just like a gun fight: aim at your target with the Left Trigger (L2), but press B instead of RT (R2). Niko will punch if your not holding a direction, but if you are, he’ll push the person over instead. He will also use his weapon he has equipped like a knife or a baseball bat (whichever one you chose). You again have a radar on the bottom left of the screen, showing you where you are in Liberty City. It also has a bar circled around it showing you health on the left, and your armor on the right. Changing weapons has once again become a pain in a Grand Theft Auto game. In GTA IV, you have to press left and right on the D-Pad in order to cycle through your weapons. Sometimes you have to do this in the heat of battle, and you will got shot many times before you have the right weapon equipped. The only GTA-like game to do weapon management right was Saints Row, which you held down the B button and you cycled through the weapons like a wheel with the left analog stick. Why couldn’t they do this in GTA IV? It just made the game a lot easier to play, but in GTA IV, it becomes a pain in the ass. The HUD also shows your money and weapons in the top right corner, and your cell phone in the bottom right. The cell phone is a major addition to GTA IV, and you will use it a lot during the main quest. You get out your cell phone by pressing up on the D-Pad, then you navigate through it with the D-Pad. The cell phone keeps people’s number your in contact with like your friends and (I guess) business partners. Your friends will call you a lot during the main story asking you to go to the bar, playing pool, playing darts, or even to go to a strip club. You can also access multiplayer (yes, online multiplayer, not offline), change your ring tone, and even your theme eventually. You can also keep driving and walking when using your cell phone, but sadly you can get into a car while doing so. The cops act a lot different in GTA IV too, but it’s a welcome addition. Instead of just randomly running away from cops, then the stars randomly disappearing, there is a giant circle around the area you’re in on the map. The circle starts out small, but gets bigger when you gain more stars. To get away, you have to try and escape the circle, then stay outside without a cop seeing you. The police officers will call other cops around you if you somehow escape to try and find you. If a cop does somehow find you (most of the time when you have 2 or more, they will), you’ll have to start all over again. Sometimes a helicopter will fly above, and when this happens, you’ll have to escape from the cops on the ground, and the helicopter as well. This just make it that much harder, but way more fun. The map of Liberty City is giant, and at the start of the game, you would get lost a lot if it wasn’t for the trusty GPS system implemented in GTA IV. When you press start and go to your map, you can set a waypoint where ever you want, and the game will show a line of the fastest way to the waypoint. The colour of the line is dark green though, which still doesn’t make any sense to me why they made it dark green instead lime green like Saints Row. Sometimes the dark green line will look like a split in a road, so you’ll turn down another road, or just stop in confusion. Luckily the mission-based routes are yellow instead of dark green, making it a lot easier to see where the hell you’re going. Later in the game however, you will most likely get more and more used to the city, so you’ll be able to skip a lot of GPS routes. You can also turn GPS Voice on from the options menu, and it will tell you (only if you’re in a ‘newer’ car), in words, where the next turn is, and when to stop. It’s a cool addition, but seriously, it’s annoying after a while. After you’re done the main story, you will still have a lot of things to do. There’s still hidden packages in the game, but instead of an item to collect, you now have Pigeons to shoot. You can try and find them like past hidden packages, but it becomes more of a challenge because sometimes the gunfire will alert a cop, and you will have to run from them. You can also do races by calling up one of your friends (Brucie). The races arrange from short and easy, to long and difficult, but are never too hard (make sure you have a fast car with good handling though). You can also deliver packages of drugs for Little Jacob, Police Missions from the Police Computer, and steal cars for Brucie and Stevie. Stealing cars is a lot different in GTA IV though, because instead of a list showing you the kind of cars that you need, Brucie e-mails you a picture and a location of a specific car or bike, and Stevie sends you the picture and location through text messaging. So instead of finding a Sabre GT in general, you will have to look in South Bohan on a certain street, and it should be parked in a parking lot, or something similar to that. It a lot easier, which is very disappointing. I loved the way you had to find a type of car, no matter where it way, then park it in a garage, or use the crane. I liked it a lot better in the past GTA games. It’s still fun none-the-less however. Another way to drain time is in the multiplayer, accessed through your cell phone during the main game. The coolest thing about GTA IV’s online is the ability to play around in Liberty City until the host is ready for a game. The online games take place in Liberty City, you can pick a certain spot, or you can pick the whole city if need be. You can turn pedestrians on, how high the traffic is, the weather, and even the time of day. But the modes in the multiplayer of GTA IV is just astounding. You have your standard free mode where you can just mess around in Liberty City with your friends doing anything you want. That means you go on rampages, do bike jumps together, pretty much anything you want. You could even shoot each other if you really wanted to. It’s a blast to kill your friends while they’re in the air doing a stunt, and watching them burn after you have already blown them up with a rocket launcher. You also have your standard death match and team death match where you just try to take down as many enemies as you possibly can before the time runs out, typical death match. I actually find this mode to be the most fun, I don’t know why, it just is. There’s a mode called Cops N’ Crooks where one team plays as the Crooks, and one team plays as the cop. The objective for the Crooks is to get to an extraction point before the cops kill you. It’s a blast to try and get to the extraction point before the Cops get you, sometimes you’ll be on the edge of your seat the whole time. The Cops objective is pretty obvious: stop the Crooks by attempting to kill them. There’s also Mafia Works that has all of the players receiving a message from the head honcho to complete a certain task before the other players do. It’s fun, but it’s not the most fun out of them all. You also have Turf War which is like king of the hill, but isn’t as fun. Car Jack City is a mode where you try and steal a car and make it to the garage with the least amount of damage done to it. Then there’s the standard GTA Race which is as obvious as it sounds, but it’s fun just to get out of your car, and kill the people, then finish the race by yourself, but it’s difficult. With all of this stuff comes the 50 achievements only seen in the Xbox 360 version. They arrange from story based, to ridiculous like surviving 5 minutes in 6 stars of wanted level. Some of them are glitched, like rolling a car 5 times in one crash. It can be done with only 3 rolls for some reason. Most of the achievements are fun to try and get, like escaping from 4 stars, or blowing up 10 cars in 10 seconds, but some of them will get very frustrating like killing all 200 pigeons and getting 100% game progression. Rockstar’s games are never known for their incredible visuals, and even though the city of Liberty City looks amazing, there’s still a lot of annoyances that make the graphics far from perfect. First, though, the animation during the cut scenes are fantastic. People’s mouth’s move exactly like they’re supposed to, their arms, legs, and pretty much everything go as they’re supposed to also. But the in-game cut scenes still have though stiff animations that the GTA series have also had a problem with. There’s a lot of pop in, especially when you’re first starting the game up. You’ll be running out of your apartment, then all of the sudden a bookcase will show up right beside you. This never seems to happen with cars on the street (thank god) but it is still odd. But since the city looks so beautiful (especially up in the sky in a helicopter), it makes up for a lot of GTA IV’s downfalls. Every building looks amazingly realistic with windows looks like they can be smashed into, and they have divots and indentations making them look real, instead of featureless blocks. The character models finally look realistic in a GTA game, but the lack of customization hurts. There are only 3 clothing stores in the entire city (5 technically): a Russian Shop, Modo (a regular Joe shop), and 3 Perseus’ which is a suit store with nice boots and suits. None of the clothing look really cool, maybe some of the suits, but that’s pretty much it. You can also put on a couple of hats and sun glasses, but that’s pretty much it. You can’t edit anything else like Niko’s beard, hair… Or anything else for that matter. There’s no getting fat, skinny, or anything like that. You can’t supe-up cars, you can only change their colour in the pay and spray. You can find some cars with spoilers and such, but nothing more. The audio in GTA IV far exceeds the visuals however. Remember all of those classic radio stations in Vice City and San Andreas? Well, if you loved them, then you will love the stations in GTA IV even more. All of the amazing dialog from the chat shows are all here, and are even funnier. The music in the stations are also pretty good, but like past GTA games, they will get repetitive after a while. The voice acting is also quite incredible Niko and Roman actually sound like they’re from Russia. All of the characters also sound perfect. The only exception is Little Jacob who is a Rastafarian, and you can never understand what the hell he is saying. The script is also impressive, sounding like an Oscar winning movie sometimes. The sounds like the cars, to the explosions, to the gunfire sound great too. Overall, Grand Theft Auto IV is an amazing. It does have many disappointments where you wonder why that certain things aren’t in the game like supping-up cars, but all of the upsides of GTA IV make up for all of the great things it could have had, but is missing. The story and the amazing Liberty City really bring this game together as one of best GTA games of all time. Mix those in with the improved combat system like taking cover, and you will remember this game for a long time. Not only will you spend a good 40 hours on the main story, but you will also love to come back and do all of the extra missions like the Police Missions, and stealing cars. If you have even liked, just a little bit, of the past GTA games, then you are going to love the hell out of GTA IV. It has (almost) everything you’d want, plus things you didn’t even think we needed. Buy this game, even though a tad over-rated, it’s still incredible.
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Delirium	May 17 2008, 02:13 PM Post #2
Posts: 10,085 Group: Active Ancients Member #680 Joined: June 24, 2005 Coins 10	The way you change the control scheme to match both the 360 and PS3 is hella annoying. I also believe he isn't Russian. >_>



zane09	May 17 2008, 02:16 PM Post #3
Burst link! Posts: 6,602 Group: Active Ancients Member #6,754 Joined: December 30, 2007 Gender Male Coins 11	He is from Serbia.
	Holy Crap I'm old


LK	May 17 2008, 05:44 PM Post #4
iminspace Posts: 18,081 Group: Active Ancients Member #794 Joined: July 28, 2005 Gender Male Coins 5	I thought he was Russian the whole time. :lol: But yeah, I fixed it. And by the way Delirium, you must be using the classic controls, because the default controls are the same as the PS3's controls.
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Analysis	May 18 2008, 03:40 AM Post #5
Birdo Posts: 1,205 Group: Birdo Member #5,289 Joined: October 23, 2007	LK rater ftw!
	The Rist Forums


Truncator	May 18 2008, 08:08 PM Post #6
Yoshi Posts: 1,424 Group: Yoshi Member #6,015 Joined: November 30, 2007	Nice review, I think you have my vote for the nex RotM contest.



zane09	May 18 2008, 09:09 PM Post #7
Burst link! Posts: 6,602 Group: Active Ancients Member #6,754 Joined: December 30, 2007 Gender Male Coins 11	KDBQ126 May 18 2008, 08:08 PM Nice review, I think you have my vote for the nex RotM contest. He has mine too. How did you think he was from Russia? He says stuff about Serbia throughout the game especially in the beginning.
	Holy Crap I'm old


LK	May 18 2008, 09:48 PM Post #8
iminspace Posts: 18,081 Group: Active Ancients Member #794 Joined: July 28, 2005 Gender Male Coins 5	I honestly don't know how I missed it. I just thought he was Russian.
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zane09	May 18 2008, 10:07 PM Post #9
Burst link! Posts: 6,602 Group: Active Ancients Member #6,754 Joined: December 30, 2007 Gender Male Coins 11	Well we all make mistakes lol.
	Holy Crap I'm old


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