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Grand Theft Auto IV Quick Observations
So I'm about five hours into GTAIV and I have the following quick observations:
- I am actually watching TV ... inside a video game ... on my TV. Trippy.
- The most impressive animation I've seen so far? Characters walking down the stairs. Finally someone has mastered this animation (I'm actually serious.).
- A single hot dog on the street costs $5 and a new leather coat only costs $34? Living in the "real" New York City I have to tell you that that is surprising close to accurate.
- "Date" a woman and earn some warm coffee? It's great that Rockstar can poke fun of everyone including themselves.
- Damn there is a lot of cursing in this game, even for a GTA game it's a bit shocking. Everyone is dropping f-bombs ... pedestrians, DJs on the radio, TV hosts, everyone is cursing all the time. M for Mature indeed.
- Gas in the GTAIV world costs less than in the real world ($3.59 a gallon in GTAIV). It would have been cool if Rockstar dynamically changed the price of gas in the game in accordance to real world prices ... and just freaking sad.
- Multiplayer is scary fun ... worth the price of the game alone.
- Once again I can never find anything good to listen to on the radio....
- And finally GTAIV is much better than any of the past GTA games. Rockstar has taken the best parts of GTAIII, Bully, and The Warriors and made a deeper more cohesive game.
What do you guys think of the game so far?
love the walking down stairs
Posted by Robert McNamara at April 30, 2008 11:16 AMI love the new euphoria physics engine and the way cars handle, it's not arcady anymore :)...
...oh and Niko is awesome!!!
Posted by Bosnique at April 30, 2008 1:20 PMI still think Vice City was the best.
I've had some major major problems with the camera, not problems with the game, but it annoying compared to the other GTA games where it was stuck to the front of the car. Don't think I'm that far into the story, but i've played a good 6 hours of it and I must tell you, its boring. Not the story, the missions. Seems like I played 6 hours of GTA tutorial.
Then the thing that I hate the most. Being thrown out of your car when you crash. First time it happened, thought I accidently hit the bail out button. Then next time I saw my character go flying out the windshield. Ya its realistic, but in the heat of a mission, I really don't want to have this happen(like gas tanks causing instant explosion in san andreas[that's gone now]).
Although on the radio thing. I just plain think that GTA4 has a terrible selection of radiostations. One of the big reasons why I liked Vice City was the great music(along with K-Chat which was my favorite station) San andreas had a pretty good selection, but GTA4 I just really don't care for. Most of the time I just wanna turn it off.
Btw the 360 version has an achievement to kill a rockstar developer. That'll probably only be possible within the first couple weeks. Think companies shouldn't do achievements like that.
Posted by Tarious at April 30, 2008 2:40 PMYou can fly out of cars in crashes? Hmm..if they chose to implement that, they should have also implemented seatbelts.
Posted by Gungnir at April 30, 2008 7:23 PMOnce again I can never find anything good to listen to on the radio....
I hear that. Although I haven't got number 4 yet Vice City had the only decent radio stations. In fact outside of Chatterbox all the good stations are on VC.
Posted by Cobra at April 30, 2008 11:50 PMI think I heard something about there being a law against seatbelts in the game world, but I could have just made that up.
Posted by Sub at May 1, 2008 12:25 AMThe Journey! I listen to that radiostation alot.
I love the game. Finally the cars are having weight to them like they did in GTA III, and the Euphoria engine is just a beauty.
I like the way they have hid the jumps so you really have to look for them, and the "collectible" this time is way more challenging.
Posted by thorjarle.com at May 1, 2008 1:06 AMI'm only 10 percent in so far but amazing, just amazing. I don't really know how to put it. Love the characters so far, especially Niko. Weirdly enough the gas is exactly the same price as in the game where I live.
Oh and got it for PS3. Can't wait to see to see the sales between Xbox 360 v. PS3, should be interesting.
Posted by Mourer at May 1, 2008 6:29 AMUm, I think Assassin's Creed had a pretty good animation for walking up and down the stairs.
Posted by Thingy at May 1, 2008 2:42 PMNo, Assassins Creed had the same animation like he ran down just a slope, not a stair where he stepped on individual steps.
I just noticed today with the destructions of cars. Before in GTA the car caught on fire and then exploded, but now this doesnt need to happen. If the car gets enough damage it can just stop working and make Niko swear and try to start the piece of crap.
I love the taxi, that you can hail one and drive to all the places where you want to go. And if you want to hear something else on the radio, Niko asks nicely if the taxidriver could change the radiostation.
This game is beautiful.
Posted by thorjarle.com at May 1, 2008 4:56 PMI just played Assassins Creed yesterday and I could swear he Altair was actually running down stairs and not a slope D:
Posted by Thingy at May 1, 2008 8:02 PM"Btw the 360 version has an achievement to kill a rockstar developer. That'll probably only be possible within the first couple weeks. Think companies shouldn't do achievements like that."
Posted by Tarious at April 30, 2008 2:40 PM
I'm hazarding a wild guess that this is a humorous jab at Jack Thompson (known anti-GTA and general anti-video-gaming protester) for his promise a while back that he would donate $10k to a charity if someone made a game where a father of a killed child would run amok and kill the heads of game developers/distributers.
Someone did indeed make that game back then, but JT refused to pay and said it was just a joke.
Trivia: Penny Arcade (www.penny-arcade.com) then made good on HIS promise and donated the 10k to a charity in his name for him. Go gamers!
It seems likely to me that the mentioned achievement has some relation to that :)
Posted by Jonathan at May 2, 2008 10:09 AMI've played about twenty hours since tuesday.
At first I was underwhelmed, but slowly you begin to realise that there's a depth to the game world unparalleled in gaming.
The radio stations grow on you, I now like them.
Surfing the internet is hilarious fun.
The combat and driving physics take a little getting used to, but once you master them they're better than previous games in the series.
Niko is frighteningly likeable, in previous games the main character was an avatar for the player, here you feel as if you're in his story, not your own.
The game provides cinematic experiences like no other, both as part of the main story, and things that you can do yourself that get played out in just the right way to make them so cool to watch.
I haven't tried the online mode yet, I'm playing with the PS3 and am waiting for my 360 version to arrive before I go online.
Using the phone to ineract within the game was a stroke of genius.
(yes, I bought both versions, and I don't regret it one bit)
AWESOME! Just awesome. I am totally speachless. For 5 hours I have been playing Rockstars masterpiece, and the everything is so perfect that the few things that are anoying can easily be ignored, this is a must have for sure. No way I'll have time to finnish Assassins Creed now.
Posted by Huckbuck at May 2, 2008 2:45 PMYou keep finding out little details that just blow you away.
About ten minutes ago I was hurtling down a highway when my car smashed into the back of another car. I flew thorugh the windshied and landed in a heap, but luckily I had enough health to survive.
As I got to my feet I looked at the car I had crashed into, and the driver was dead.
But guess what?
So were the two passengers in the back seat.
I pulled the driver out of the car and was able to drive around with the two corpses in the back of the car, it was like playing a game version of Weekend at Bernies.
This game is just full of the tiniest little details like that.
Posted by Cruithne at May 2, 2008 7:37 PM"Gas in the GTAIV world costs less than in the real world ($3.59 a gallon in GTAIV)"
Gas here is only around 3.29-3.39 / gallon
Posted by Somebody at May 3, 2008 8:22 PMPlayed this for a bit when an acquaintance brought it round.
First off I love the new melee combat system. I was surprised and delighted when I was able to actually wrestle a knife from the hands of a guy attacking me. (Which I then used to go on a sadistic killing spree >_>)
The new wanted system is great too. No more just blundering round aimlessly hoping you might randomly lose a star.
Posted by Krakow Sam at May 5, 2008 9:34 AMMy favorite features of GTA4 are the ease with which I can retry a failed mission and the auto-saving that prevents my having to return to a safe house after each mission. Those two changes have removed a great deal of petty annoyance from the game's formula, leaving me more time to bask in the glorious presentation of the game.
Nice job, Rockstar!
This game is too good for its own good. I haven't been this addicted to anything since FF VII..
Posted by Thingy at May 6, 2008 4:15 PMThis is the only game i can remember since the great Final Fantasy VIII that i can play for 4 days straight without getting bored.
Pure class! 10/10
Posted by Devro at May 7, 2008 6:09 PMIs there a pc version coming out?
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