GTA IV - our review and your thoughts on the game (and how you got it)

It's finally here - yes, Grand Theft Auto IV is set to rewrite the gaming rules. Read on for our review and let us know what you think of the game in the comments below.

Few games would be brave enough to cast their player as an illegal immigrant, fresh off the boat, scratching out a living in the underbelly of an American city. After all, driving unmarked taxis around for pittance hardly sounds like a winning-premise for the biggest videogame event of the year. But the Grand Theft Auto series has never played by the rules and in Eastern European protagonist Niko Bellic, the series has found an asylum seeker with more depth and character than ten thousand lantern-jawed American hero archetypes.  

Nico’s arrival in Liberty City is without fanfare: his optimist cousin Roman greets him at the dockside in the middle of the night. It was Roman’s letters, filled with embellished tales of beautiful women, fine living and untold riches, that brought Nico to America in the first place. But Roman’s liberty with the truth served only to hide the grim reality of his existence. With only a ramshackle apartment and cluster of hungry loan sharks to his name, his tale is about as far from the American dream as one can get.

To begin with you join Roman in small business, running his taxis, working hard to pay off debts and slowly but surely working your way out of poverty. The cut-scenes that tell the story flow seamlessly with the interactive sections, characters engaging in deep and meaningful conversations as you walk and drive about. The game’s decent script is improved by some sterling voice acting and the life-like motion-capture elevates the game up to the quality of gritty TV crime dramas such as The Sopranos or The Wire. The story heaves and develops over its 40 hours with pace and urgency. Indeed, the sense of being a nobody who slowly but surely becomes a somebody is relentlessly compelling.

Liberty City, the expansive, heaving, breathing backdrop to the game is aptly named. The freedom it affords Nico is unrivalled. If America is the land of opportunity then Liberty City is its apex, offering players a giddying range of activities and possibilities that dwarf those offered by the competition. It’s much smaller than the State-sized play area seen in previous game, San Andreas, but in reducing the game’s breadth, RockStar has been able to vastly increase its height and depth. The fidelity of the metropolis, the detail and attention that has been lavished on even its most humble alleyways and drug corners, is nothing short of staggering.

Steam rises from ground vents, just as torn newspaper pages catch the wind; train tracks rattle and clack below, just as helicopters and jumbo jets tear streak lines in the sky far above. The sense that you are in a fully functioning capital, one that bristles with life and vitality, is unparalleled in videogames. There are clothes shops, Irish-themed pubs, steamy strip joints, bowling alleys, variety clubs, stand-up venues, wine bars and fast food joints, all of which can be frequented and patronised as their real-life counterparts. Liberty City is the ultimate playground, one whose awe-inspiring revelations continue for weeks, not mere hours.

But GTA IV’s innovations aren’t to be measured solely in graphics, physics and raw technology. The core play mechanics have here been oiled and perfected. Chief amongst the game’s inventions is Nico’s mobile phone, a device that can be called up with a tap of a button. From here you receive missions via text message, call girlfriends, acquaintances and employers and generally organise your schedule with a minimum of hassle. As the mobile can be navigated while driving it’s possible to call ahead to people you are already on your way to meet. Thanks to the phone the game experience is immeasurably smoothed, freeing you up from menus and integrating you ever more closely with the game world. Fail a mission and it’s as simple as accepting a text message to try it again, albeit with different dialogue for the repeat attempt.

Similarly, in-car Sat Nav brings true convenience to the experience. GPRS will plot a route for you to any destination, one glance at the tiny but readable map in the bottom left hand corner of the screen providing an instant readout of where you’re headed. When engaged in a car chase you can lock onto your target and, by punching out the driver seat glass you can fire openly out of the car window. And if driving to your destinations is too much hassle (or if you’ve had a few too many beers at one of the bars and, thanks to the blurry screen are unfit to take the wheel) then simply hail a cab and enjoy the lifelike view from the back seat.  

Outside of the vehicles the game has also been overhauled. Nico runs with a weight and authenticity lacking in previous iterations and seamless rooftop pursuits (in which you leap from building to building) are a filmic joy to engage in. A flick of a button will have Nico lock into nearby cover, allowing players to take a more stealthy approach. Aiming and firing of weapons is a lot easier now, allowing you to target knees and other non-fatal body regions with a flick of a button.

A list of the game’s raw triumphs and innovations would be too huge for this review but it’s in the incidental and unscripted dramas that unfold around you that GTA IV’s true genius lies. Of course, as our videogame recreations of real cities become closer to reality, so our expectations rise. It’s testament to the game’s tight logic and consistency that the spell of immersion is only very rarely broken. Open world games aren’t for everyone but even the most hardnosed GTA detractor would struggle to not applaud Rockstar’s latest and greatest accomplishments. It is without doubt the best free-roaming game yet released, one whose achievements will undoubtedly cause repercussions throughout the industry for years to come.

5/5

So what do you think then? Planning to queue up at midnight to get? Or maybe planning some holiday this week to play? Let us know your thoughts below...