So the mother of all games has launched. Opening to projected sales of $400 million comes the megaton, 1000 lbs gorilla game launch. Grand Theft Auto 4. The amount of hype for this game has been absolutely ridiculous, but did the game measure up to the hype?
It absolutely did. Here’s the thing you should know. I’m not a fan of the GTA series. I thought GTA3 was interesting, but ultimately I just didn’t enjoy it. I thought Vice City was ok as it added a lot of what i thought was missing in GTA3. Namely more vehicles, clothes changes, and the ability to buy property. San Andreas on the other hand was just too massive. There was way too much to do and keep track of for my taste. Essentially the freedom paralyzed me and all i ended up doing was eating and going to the gym. Not my idea of fun. Thankfully they got rid of the excessive freedom and sheer map size of San Andreas for the first big next gen release GTA4.
Next gen. That’s a term that gets thrown around a lot. Especially when most games are decidedly NOT next gen. Madden? That’s the same swill that’s been pumped out every year but with marginally improved graphics and moronic modes nobody cares about. Rainbow 6 Vegas 2? Well, hopefully you saw my review of that. I stand by my original verdict that it’s a piece of shit. GTA4 though…. everything about this game is better than its predecessor. When i say better i don’t mean marginally better either. I mean a quantum fucking leap. The graphics are amazing. There are times i’ll drive over a hill and get a glimpse of the horizon full of buildings at sunset. I’ll invariably crash because i can’t stop gawking at how amazing it looks. The animations are great. The Euphoria animation system really helps give the characters realistic movements, especially when there is uneven terrain. The best thing though? The characterizations. As recently as my condemned review i lamented the one dimensional nature of gaming characters. Well GTA4’s Niko Bellic is finally a great 3 dimensional character. Not only that but he’s even got a distinctive design and look. The rest of the supporting cast is pretty 1 dimensional but it’s taken to the point of satire so it’s pretty damn funny.
Another thing i love about the game is all the humor. The radio ad’s, the posters and billboards. I found myself laughing out loud a few times. Like the talk radio spot where they talk about the jingo act. A personal favorite is the conservative radio station.
I think it’s pretty obvious that i really like this game. Buy it. Besides if you’re looking for a game to play there’s really nothing else out at this moment right? Unless you have a wii… and want to play the millionth incarnation of mario kart.
Just a final word. I played the game on the xbox 360, however i’ve seen a lot of talk on the net lately about the better version. I’ve seen comparison videos and honestly can’t tell the difference. They say the ps3 version ‘only’ runs at 630p vs 720 for the 360, and that it freezes or whatever. It’s all just rabid fanboyism. No matter what console you get it for you should be happy. The only thing is the downloadable content that’s supposed to be exclusive to the 360. As of now nobody knows what it is though. So c’mon, we have enough partisanship in our politics do we need to be annoying little bitches about our videogames too?
Posted on May 4th, 2008 by phaedrus
Filed under: videogames
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