Final thoughts...

[kaneda]

Okay...so I've got some time on my hands and I decided to do up a review of GTA IV...just for the hell of it. I'm yet to get my 100% finish of the game, but I'm far enough to give a valid opinion. I'll just go ahead and break this sucker up into sections. It'll be lengthy, yes...but...but I don't know how to finish that sentence.


Story & characters:

Well I found the story to be a little uninspired and lazy. It seems that anyone of Eastern European origin appearing in a video game lately has invariably been involved in some un-named war. The old tale of the insatiable need for vengeance, and the price one often has to pay to exact it has been around since Moby Dick. I suppose the story side of a video game will always suffer when so much attention and budget is being focused on the technological aspect.

On the other hand, Niko is probably one of the best and most believable GTA characters. His whole demeanor and attitude toward other characters is just so incredibly stylish and cool. He's the European version of Jules Winnfield from Pulp Fiction (Sam L Jackson's character). Unfortunately most of the other characters are either cliched, underused or just plain irritating. I chose to kill Playboy mainly because I saw Dwayne as another cool character when he first entered the story...alas it didn't take long for him to become a whining, melodramatic head-case. Outside of Niko, Packie and Gerry were about the only characters that were entertaining.

Gameplay & Missions:

Might sound like the same thing, but bare with me. Gameplay is more about everything that happens between missions: driving cars, interacting with the city, etc. This is one of the game's high points - particularly in reference to driving. I'm on the XB360 version of GTA IV, so I don't know whether the same can be said about the PS3 version, but driving cars around is a sheer joy. The amount of control you have over speed, braking and steering just makes driving a lovely experience. It almost doesn't matter what piece of shit car you're driving - it's still fun to drive. In a city so large, driving from location to location could easily become an annoying chore (as it tended to become in SA...*shudder*), but driving is so fluid that you almost can't wait to go somewhere. Unfortunately, the same can't be said about bikes. Lynch me if you must, but the bikes in GTA IV suck major ass...but I'll go into that in more detail later.

The city itself offers interactivity on a level that I've personally never seen in a game. Although the player's physical limitations make exploration a bit stagnant, it is still fun to occasionally take a stroll and just people watch. My only real beef with the player on foot was somewhat clunky controls. This having to turn around, rather than pivoting on the one spot (which people actually can do, believe it or not) could make accurate maneuvering of the player sometimes frustrating. Of course, it's something the player ultimately adapted to, but that didn't make it any less annoying.

Combat was another slight sore point for me. A bit of a trial initially, it wasn't long before it became second nature. However, I just thought it to be a little indirect at times. Crouching for cover is a nice addition to the combat mechanics, but there were too many inconsistencies in what you could and couldn't take cover behind, and a little too much room for error in regards to taking cover behind the wrong thing. Thankfully any clunkiness of the combat system was more than made up for by much more frenetic combat than in past GTA outings. In scripted missions it was much more elaborate and movie-like, but even just equipping yourself up for a random bout of mayhem out on the city streets made for some hectic thrills and spills. It's the kind of combat you'd expect to see in a COD episode or a Tom Clancy game...only better.

On the missions side of things...I'm kind of half in, half out. While some of the missions really stood out (Four Leaf Clover being the best GTA mission I've ever played), the percentage of these gems was way too small. A lot of missions were uncreative and just plain blah. One mission in particular saw you having to ferry a truck laiden with explosives to a location before exiting said truck and triggering said explosives...that old gag's been around since GTA 2. Missions like Three Leaf Clover: lengthy, exciting, intense...that's what I was really hoping to see much more of. On the upside, the mission structure was nice (via mobile contacts), and the ability to replay a mission without having to cart yourself off to the origin point was a gem of an idea.

Graphics & Sound:

It goes without saying that this is where the game excels. To now go back and play within GTA III's version of Liberty City would be tantamount to breaking off your relationship with Jessica Alba to start afresh with Estelle Getty. The city looks and sounds so much like a true functioning city that you can be excused for talking with friends about New York like you've actually been there. The vehicles, the people...even the trash that seems to be just about everywhere you look, it's all so beautifully detailed that I found myself running into street lights quite often because I wasn't watching the road. What makes it even more pleasing to the eye are the little details that the developers didn't overlook. Cigarette smokers, rain puddles, shadows, character movements inside a vehicle. To go to such extremes to put stuff like that in, stuff that may never be seen or appreciated by a large number of players is just another sign of R*'s commitment to pushing the envelope further and further.

You know a game has a great sound team behind it when you hear in-game police officers yelling "Stop now or I'll shoot you in your ball sack!" GTA IV is jam packed with so much audio that it's difficult to know how they managed to get it all onto the same DVD as the game. There are so many radio stations that you often flick for what seems like forever before getting to the one you want. Also the often cartoonish take on sound in previous GTAs has been dropped in favour of much more realistic, gritty sound. Added to that, everything, and I do mean everything makes some kind of sound: people dropping their coffee, weapons hitting the ground after some poor sucker's been relieved of them, people stumbling down a flight of stairs (which is hilarious to watch also). All of it only adds to the already staggering degree of immersion the game holds.

Fun Stuff:

What would a GTA be without pointless fun stuff to distract you from your missions? Although GTA IV is much more pared back than VC & SA, it still offers a lot of things to do to wile away the hours long after all the missions have been finished.

Most Wanted - A different take on Vigilante which is a little more structured than just driving around to random points on the map and blowing up vehicles. It's not too bad, but I would have liked to see some kind of pay-off for taking the time to do them all.

Street Races - One of the GTA mainstays that actually made it into IV. The problem I had with this little side-game is that you weren't restricted to driving the same vehicle as your opponents (like in SA). So showing up to the starting grid of a race in a Turismo or Banshee put you at a distinct advantage over your family wagon or SUV driving opponents. Fun to do, but a little too easy most of the time.

Sports - Of the three so-called 'sports', bowling was the only one I really enjoyed. Unfortunately R* still don't have the physics of a believable pool table down-pat, and playing Darts was pretty much over before it even started. Bowling, on the other hand, was fun and a nice challenge. I suppose in a game where social interaction plays a pretty important role, these little tidbits made it all the easier.

Girlfriends - Well this was an aspect of SA that I found unnecessary and dull...and that opinion didn't really change in IV. Some of the girlfriends gave you neat little abilities (if you can call them that), but they usually became so annoyingly needy that the nuisance factor far outweighed any benefit.

Pigeons/Jumps - Another mainstay that found it's way into IV. My problem with them on this occasion (particularly those accursed pigeons) is that there wasn't any real pay-off for taking the trouble to get them all. You get your 100%, yeah...and you get your damn 'achievement', but for the love of Pete...give me something I can have fun with. Reward me with a fancy car, or a one-off weapon...something that I can utilize and have fun with. Otherwise, what's the point of me taking all that time? To say I got 100% completion? Big whoop! The little bonuses for busting your bunions was one of the things that made busting those bunions worthwhile.

Drinking/Eating - I guess in a functioning city, eating and drinking are par for the course. Getting drunk is one of the most hilarious things I've ever seen in a video game. The random swaying, stumbling and general waywardness of those under the influence is so close to reality that you wonder how many R* motion capture artists spent most of their working days pissed as farts. Eating's kinda neither here nor there...although I did love the Burger Shot employee who's customer greeting was "Welcome to Burger Shot, muhu-fuckaaa!"

Stunting:

Bah...humbug. That's right, I'm the GTA IV Stunting Scrooge. As I mentioned earlier, the bikes in GTA IV suck major ass. Why do they suck major ass? Because...they just do. It's quite apparent that the pinnacle of GTA bike physics occurred when they were designing Vice City, because it seems to have gone downhill rapidly since then. I don't hold a bike license, and I wouldn't know how to ride a motorbike if my life depended on it (so if I tried to ride one...my life WOULD depend on it), so I don't know exactly whether or not the behaviour of the bikes in GTA IV is in any way accurate...but I wouldn't like to think so. Bike steering seems to randomly go from incredibly difficult to touch sensitive completely at random. Also, I'm pretty sure that if you lightly apply the brakes on a bike while turning, that doesn't automatically stop you from turning. I'm a victim of a great deal of time spent riding bikes in VC, yes. But with that aside, the bikes in GTA IV just don't seem very rider friendly...certainly not enough to make me anxiously await the next GTA IV stunting session.

The new physics engine also provides a myriad of problems when it comes to stunting potential. When I did stunt on a bike in the new LC (which wasn't much, but enough to see what problems lay ahead), I noticed that speed was your greatest enemy. Exceeding a certain speed threshold would almost always see you hurled over the handlebars of your bike whenever you hit anything that wasn't an obvious incline. The upside I suppose is that it would also seem that you don't need a tremendous amount of speed to get good height on a successful bump. Now for another downside - what the hell kind of bike are you riding that can flip from right side up, to upside down, to sideways, to upside down again all in one jump? This ridiculous looking locking into certain axes is not only horrible to look at, it's also frustratingly unpredictable. I'm much happier having to pay a price for flipping my bike back too far, to be perfectly honest. Bike stunting (for now, at least) just seems to me to be somewhat of a dead loss. I know I'll be proven wrong...so ner-ner!

Car stunting, I believe, holds the most potential for GTA IV. Even though being flung through your front windscreen can prove to be a problem at times, the bounciness and speed of a lot of GTA IV's cars give the idea of car stunting a lot of promise. If only Niko would learn the value of the seatbelts.


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So all in all, GTA IV is a great game...but I don't know that I'd be hasty to give it a 10/10. It's definitely not the 'best game of all time' like I've read here and there. It has quite a few flaws that detract from it immensely. But on the whole it's a well-polished, slick game that I'm definitely glad to have played.

[Balance]

woah. nice review. i just saw that one message (well part of it) is writen in croatian not russian (that is from Milica Belic)

[Darkyy]

Wow, it was a long read but a good one,I agree on the big majority of the points said.

However the fun part of this game is ridiculous, it's the GTA I had the less fun going around and just try to occupy myself in the city. For sure it's quite cool to see so many details, great graphics and a very polished game but where is the fun ? Going out with your friends/girlfriends/boyfriends is just plain boring, and so are the mini-games.

The graphics are great but I don't really like them. In my opinion a game is to get out of reality and games being more and more Photorealistic like GTA IV are good to look at but it's even more fun lose and identity for a game. I would rather have some cartoonish graphics like previous GTA than playing with a real man hanging out in the street.

The physics being closer to reality is quite cool but it seems too pushed for a game like GTA and in the contrary of you saying that it was a real pleasure to drive around the city, I usually end calling a Taxi.

Stunting looks esthetically awful and unappealing to me so I won't bother I suppose.



Anyway, my remarks have to be a bit shaded as I haven't played much GTA IV even though I've got it for a good 3-4 weeks and I didn't even finished the principal missions.
This game is a big dissapointment for me.

[Genyus]

Great review, I've only seen the game in action for less than 30 minutes but I can totally agree with you. The detail and liveness of the city is just amazing. Really nice read and it's nice to read more about the stunting physics.

[impulse]

Good review!

The girlfriend stuff i didnt rlly bothered about when i still had the storyline.
After that i did date all the girls and saw some sort of fun in it but nothing rlly special.

I like bowling alot.. altough if you look up @ youtube u can see mechs are some sort fixed.
Pooling is good to, but they shouldnt make it so easy (standard shot is the best shot)
Darts is just plain easy, but nice for a variation.

Agree with u totally, when i first stepped on a bike in GTAIV..
I was like oh damn, this is way different and hard.
Also being able to backflips, frontflips and flairs on a bike seems abit to much for me.

As for carstunting it looks indeed promising, i like how cars react and i also like that each car drives differently.
I hope I (we) will be proven wrong that bike stunting isnt lost. But from what ive seen now im not rlly expecting GTA VC bike stunts (which i always loved).

Im on 80% btw.

[kr3mlin]

Thanks for the lovely read Kaneda, good to see a well thought points and considerations. I 100% agree with you on the points about driving around the city....pure bliss.

I was curious about your thoughts on planned bailing as a stunting type....you deliberately hit something to bail up onto a roof - it can be done with the landscape, any traffic, cops and in multiplayer. And it can be pushed quite far imo (this is my stunting project for IV). Its not classical stunting but it can be expanded upon and replicated

Also - any plans for multiplayer on your side? Can it be used for stunting effectively?

[kaneda]

Planned bails sounds pretty groovy, but I'd much prefer to see that utilized more with precision landings than 50X50ft roof tops...but that's just me. I'd actually love to see some kind of grenade boosting in GTA IV. Anyone who's played long enough, and has had an unfortunate accident with a grenade will know just how powerful those things are.

Multiplayer stunting might hold some potential...but I think it's best effect would be if both participants were recording at the same time. Seeing only one perspective would ruin the effect a little.

@darkky: Yeah, I sometimes found myself missing the fun elements. Not having stuff like Paramedic, Firefighter and the stadium games was a bit of a let down. But I suppose it's a different game, and no longer a sequel to GTA III.

[Infinity]

Omg . How long did you type this xD ? . Takes a bit of time to read to me:)

[wily]

bikes r col in for cus you can do bcakflips i did a backflp in a hog on a rapemp landid on a becnh it was hiliarius i deid 2. u sohld play more gta stunts wihth filps end spin lik chopper wing. gta roks for stint

[Flat Face]

i didn't write that much in my english exam... o.o Lol  i'll read it bit by bit n edit this

[KillaMarci]

I love the game , but I expected a lot more.. I wonder what rockstar though when they made the bike handling. You do a backflip in the air and the bike spins like a helicopter. I don't like backflips at all , I would like to have corks and krails back , seeing as they give you a better postiion for a grind and just look better in my opinion.

Oh and for the multiplayer thing: One player gets a helicopter and the other one jumps on his helicopter using a bike , you usually fly veeeerrry far and high

[ShoxXx]

Me love the game, too.

Its so nice! But i haven't got it

I didn't have a playsation 3 or a xbox.

i must wait for pc.

[Adonai]

Same as KM here. I want corks and krails back...

[Neo Anderson]

 my favorite emoticon I've been told.    Anyways in a nut shell, The missions I thought this time were great. Far superior to previous GTA games. They were so much more enjoyable. The only bitch I have would be you could finish all the missions way to early in the game. Thus leaving you with what I concidered boring and dull things to do to finally reach 100%. Drivin Packie, Jacob or Brucie around to do dumb shit, yes dumb shit was what I thought the down side to GTA IV was. Bowling, darts, drinking, eating? It almost seemed like they ran out of things to have you do so why not make you do dumb shit.

In the end I truely did love the game itself. The level of detail was mindblowing to say the least. I spent my first 3 hours of the game just driving around and looking at the city, just beautiful.

Stunting? well it DOES have it's potential, I'll give it that. Things are harder than VC or LC but you can bump, grind, wall ride, etc. Time will tell and I think if a PC version does come out, there will be the time you'll see stunting take off.

Every game has it's up sides and it's down sides. GTA IV, for me, is a definate 9/10.

[UtterGarbage]

eh-hem *clears throat*

Grand Theft Auto IV. The game that "defined next-generation" gaming. By UtterGarbage.

Personally when i first put in the disk i remember my hand trembling and shaking. I remember screaming don't go red rings on me now! i watch the first few scenes. My mouth open in shock. Then i'm given the ability to drive.... I was afraid to move...

I will say this much. Many people are enemies of the driving in grand theft auto iv. personally, i find it a step up. The fact the turning seems sluggish is, and anyone living alongside me in NYC can most likely voucher for me. Most if not all turns are a perfect right angles. Thus, you can't go full speed in the turn expecting to remain in your lane. it's more realistic, and that was the aim of the game.

The only true negative aspect was the speed of the cars. R* made it appear as the cars were going slower. To make the city seem larger. unofrtunately negative...

I enjoyed the storyline. However un-realistic as it was, it would make a great movie. The choices of let live/kill and who to  kill were few and far unfortunatley and many times didn't make major affects to the story excluding the final choice. It wasn't as open-ended as wanted.

lastly, the stunting. I think DC can speak for us....