games: Grand Theft Auto 4

Up today we have Grand Theft Auto 4. You play the good-looking and likable Niko Bellic, an illegal immigrant and Bosnian war veteran who comes to Liberty City and falls into his cousin Roman’s world of loan sharks and gangsters.

The plot initially revolves around Roman’s troubles, but soon connects with Niko’s back-story and a darker tale of revenge.

The core gameplay involves driving a wide variety of cars and other vehicles, hand to hand combat, and shooting, but distilling GTA4 down into components like this does it a great disservice as the real beauty is the way these core elements blend with each other and with the details of the world to give you something with an organic wholeness and depth that is mindblowing.

If you’re low on health, grabbing a hot dog or sleeping will pick you up. If you jack a car, instead of just opening the door you’ll have to smash a window. You’ll get calls on your mobile while you’re in the middle of something else, and most missions are set up by someone calling you, rather than you having to go to a dedicated mission pick up point.

It’s this level of detail that has everyone so excited.

Ignore the actual game elements for a minute and look at how much background detail there is making this world alive. The background characters’ dialogue and reactions; their independent actions; the in-game internet, TV and radio; the ability to physically interact with pretty much everything. Rockstar have also played up the relationship element of the game and you develop friendships, contacts and even go on dates, all of which helps make you invested in Niko and the world.

But nothing’s perfect and there are a few annoyances until you get used to how things work. After an early mission when driving Roman back to the depot in one of his cabs, I left the car to jack a shinier one, but instead of Roman being able to drive his own cab, it went down as abandoned and so the entire mission failed and had to be repeated.

The driving itself also takes a bit of getting used to, with turning circles not fantastic, and cars unrealistically easy to spin out. But practice does pay off and it becomes very enjoyable.

As you can see, the artwork is fantastic, and in terms of graphics and physics, this is damn sophisticated. You’re looking at the 360 version and although you can see a little clipping and pop in here and there, when you consider how much is going on it’s a tiny complaint. Character movement is astoundingly good and, combined with high quality voice acting and the predominant use of physics rather than set animations, plays its part in the games verisimilitude. The transition between gameplay and narrative cut scenes is also damn smooth.

Of course with a GTA title, people are always going to question its morality. This is a gritty, sleazy, edgy game which makes violent crime a hella fun and is as blue as a blue arsed-fly. If this sort of thing offends you, don’t buy it. Simple. But it’s not entirely gratuitous, and not without thought, although the multiple endings available, dependent on your decisions, don’t make Rockstar’s moral stance clear either way.

The portrayal of highly sexualized and rather caricatured women in the game is a little disappointing, given how well-rounded and varied the male characters are, but the advanced relationship element to the game perhaps shows a move in the right direction here, with bowling trips and dinners adding a little more to your warm coffee.

Now while GTA4 is definitely a hardcore gamer’s game, and there is a lot about its sandbox nature and complexity that could potentially put the more casual mainstream market off, it has smashed all previous video game sales records and had tonnes of mainstream press adulation. As well as being testament to what sick puppies we all are, this speaks volumes about GTA4s playability.

There’s a lot of information to take in absorbing plot, meeting characters, learning to drive, fight, use your phone and map, and in the beginning you can easily forget to concentrate on instructions as you gawk at the engine and your surroundings, but despite this, the pacing of the early tutorial missions is spot on, getting you to grips with everything but still drawing you in with exciting story and gameplay right from the start. And while control can take a while to finesse, even someone new to the series should feel pretty comfortable with how the world works within about an hour. This is sandbox with structure.

Although of course you can dive in, ignore the plot and do as you damn well please: explore the city, jack some cars, take a cab, get a lap dance, go shopping, go on a killing spree…

And if you ever feel like you’ve exhausted GTA4s possibilities, then there’s a vast array of online multiplayer options, and the 360 version will also have some extra episodes available for download in the autumn.

This is absolutely a 5 star game, and I recommend without any reservation that you buy it. Or steal it. Don’t worry, video games told you to do it.

For the best of the rest:

Gamespot:
Stepping off a boat in the shoes of illegal immigrant Niko Bellic as he arrives in Liberty City at the start of Grand Theft Auto IV, you can tell immediately that Rockstar North’s latest offering is something quite special. Yes, this is another GTA game in which you’ll likely spend the bulk of your time stealing cars and gunning down cops and criminals, but it’s also much more than that. GTAIV is a game with a compelling and nonlinear storyline, a game with a great protagonist who you can’t help but like, and a game that boasts a plethora of online multiplayer features in addition to its lengthy story mode. It’s not without some flaws, but GTAIV is undoubtedly the best Grand Theft Auto yet.

IGN:
Criminals are an ugly, cowardly lot more worthy of pity and disdain than admiration. This is what you’ll learn playing through the single-player campaign in Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto IV. The series cheered (and criticized) for glorifying violence has taken an unexpected turn: it’s gone legit. Oh sure, you’ll still blow up cop cars, run down innocent civilians, bang hookers, assist drug dealers and lowlifes and do many, many other bad deeds, but at a cost to main character Niko Bellic’s very soul. GTA IV gives us characters and a world with a level of depth previously unseen in gaming and elevates its story from a mere shoot-em-up to an Oscar-caliber drama. Every facet of Rockstar’s new masterpiece is worthy of applause. Without question, Grand Theft Auto IV is the best game since Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Game Trailers:
For Niko Bellic, fresh off the boat from Europe, it is the hope he can escape his past. For his cousin, Roman, it is the vision that together they can find fortune in Liberty City. Head back to Liberty City in Rockstar’s free-roaming masterpiece.