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Grand Theft Auto IV
by Rockstar GamesPlatform:
Xbox 360 | ESRB Rating: MatureProduct Features
- Carry on the Grand Theft Auto tradition playing through the single player campaign as Niko Bellic
- Get cars and other modes of transportation anyway you can
- Interact with various colorful characters who give you various missions to engage in
- Engage in multiplayer challenges ranging from cover matches to shoot-outs
- Game Rated 'M' due to Intense Violence, Blood, Strong Language, Strong Sexual Content, Partial Nudity, Use of Drugs and Alcohol
Download exclusive episodes on Xbox Live Marketplace starting Fall 2008
Product Details
- Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
- ASIN: B000FRU1UM
- Product Dimensions: 2 pounds
- Media: Video Game
- Release Date: April 29, 2008
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: #6 in Video Games
Product Description
Amazon.com
What does the American Dream mean today?
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, gateway to the land of opportunity. As they slip into debt and are dragged into a criminal underworld by a series of shysters, thieves and sociopaths, they discover that the reality is very different from the dream in a city that worships money and status, and is heaven for those who have them and a living nightmare for those who don’t.
Beginning with the 1997 release of the original Grand Theft Auto, the GTA series has been one of the most prolific, controversial and down right entertaining franchises in video games history. This pedigree of success guarantees that the highly anticipated eleventh game in the series, Grand Theft Auto IV, will garner at least as much attention if not more.
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The Plot
Grand Theft Auto IV is a brand new adventure in the GTA universe following the experiences of Nikolai "Niko" Bellic, a new immigrant from an undisclosed eastern European country whose troubled pa st and the persuasion of his cousin Roman have brought him to the fictional Liberty City. Unfortunately, Niko’s search for the American Dream and a much needed fresh start, hits an immediate snag when the rags to riches story Roman spun to pique Niko's interest is exposed as not only a complete fabrication, but a ploy to enlist Niko’s well-known skills as a tough guy against the ample list of enemies clamoring for Roman’s debt-ridden blood.
Because Roman is the only person Niko knows in Liberty City he begrudgingly accepts his role as Roman’s protector despite the deception. But as time goes on Niko comes into his own, and his experience on the wrong side of the tracks proves more valuable than he could have ever imagined as he fights for survival and later supremacy on the crime ridden streets of Liberty City.
Game Environments
Based on several of the boroughs of New York City and parts of New Jersey, Liberty City, familiar to players of previous games in the series, has been entirely redesigned for GTA IV. Players can expect visible detail down to the weeds growing in the cracks in the sidewalk, cars and buildings of visibly different ages and a much greater level if verticality in the buildings and bridges that they are able to explore as Niko moves through the city streets. In addition, pedestrians in GTA IV are much more realistic. No longer simply moving cardboard cutouts, these NPCs are intelligent, modern, human representations that laugh, cry, eat, drink, use cell phones and ATMs, and talking amongst themselves regardless of Niko’s interaction with them.
Gameplay
Historically GTA games have focused heavily on mission-based play, requiring successful completion of fixed tasks in order for players to progress through the game, but this has changed to a great extent in GTA IV. Players will experience an entirely new and exciting emphasis centered on the blending of on-mission and off-mission play, resulting not only in an increased sense of realism, but more interesting and unrestricted gameplay.
Features
Aside from the car jacking and a detailed city environment here are the new features for GTA IV:
- Improved combat system - Now you can use cover and also a target lock system, which allows you to take out targets with greater ease and accuracy. Plus, you can engage in some hand-to-hand combat if you can't get your hands on a piece quick enough.
- Cell phone - Not just for basic phone calls anymore. Use your in-game cell phone to receive missions via SMS, snap photos, and ZiT (tag) songs that can be downloaded exclusively on Amazon.com/mp3.
- Free time - In between missions you can take advantage of "me" time. There are gentleman's clubs, comedy clubs, bowling alleys, and bars, which all house unique activities.
- Take a break from the storyline - A variety of side missions allow you to help run a car service, "borrow" cop cars, assassinate targets, help solve problems for those on the street, or take to the air with stunt jumps that are scattered all over the city.
- Control your own fate - Throughout the game choice moments will arrive causing you to make a decision that will affect relationships and money.
Multiplayer
Give Niko a rest and create your own multiplayer "hero." GTA has added multiplayer modes allowing you to take your creation out to play online in competitive, co-op, and free form modes. Competitive mode has you fighting against the cops, jacking cars, or racing to finish odd jobs. Co-op challenges you and your friends with various tasks including Hangman's NOOSE where you are responsible for escorting a wanted kingpin to a safe extraction point. Freeform lets you and 15 others lose on Liberty City. Use this mode to hit up the bar and play virtual darts versus each other or head out to the streets and set up your own drag races. If you can dream it, you can do it in Freeform mode.
ZiT: We'll Spot The Song For You
When playing Grand Theft Auto IV, if you hear a song that you are interested in buying as an MP3, all you have to do is dial ZiT-555-0100 on your in-game mobile phone and a text message will be sent to you with the name of the artist and the title of the track. The next time you log in at the Rockstar Games Social Club, you will find 30-second previews of all the songs you have ZiT'ed while playing the game. You can add them to your basket there and click to purchase at Amazon MP3, or you can find them all at www.amazon.com/gtamusic.
Video Game Review by 1UP.com (What's this?)
Learn more about this game at 1UP.com 
By Crispin Boyer -- 27/4/2008
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The upshot: Liberty City is no longer just a place you explore outdoors, looking for stunt jumps or the thrill of a six-star wanted level after riling up the LCPD during missions. I spent hours of my week-long review session checking out the game's indoor attractions, parking Niko in front of his TV and PC, watching red-state-riffing shows like Republican Space Rangers while cruising personals on the game's version of Craigslist. If Niko still lived in prequel city San Andreas, where diet and exercise made a difference, he'd have weighed 400 pounds by the time I finished this game.
But Rockstar wisely toned down the character-customization elements this time and focused on a more engrossing aspect: interpersonal relationships. Roman, Niko's head-in-the-clouds cousin who lured him to America with promises of wealth and women, gives our hero an upgradeable cellphone early on. As you meet people, their contact info is added to your phone. Niko can ring them up to grab a bite, go bowling, shoot darts, get s***faced (good luck evading the fuzz while driving under the influence of the game's insane drunk-driving physics), or partake in any number of other activities. Stay on top of these relationships and they'll become friends with benefits. One nurse Niko dates, for instance, can heal him with over-the-phone medical advice. (The local prostitutes have learned a few tricks, however, and are as eager as ever to boost your health for a few bucks.)
If all of this networking sounds as much fun as helping a friend move, keep in mind that it's optional. I powered through the game avoiding much of that stuff -- and it still took me 36 hours from start to finish. All of Niko's crucial bonding moments happen during the missions anyway, which do an amazing job of integrating your contacts, their personalities, and the city's multimedia assault. One standout job, for example, has Niko posing as a homosexual lothario on an online dating site to lure a gay thug to a rendezvous. Yep, the missions pack all of the hilarious writing the series is famous for, except now they occasionally offer the option to spare the lives of characters you've hunted down in hot pursuits -- decisions that affect the overall story. They give GTA4 a new element of replayability, although I suspect players will turn quickly to the excellent multiplayer modes once they've completed the epic single-player game.
During our marathon multiplayer test session, the developers shared one of their favorite custom games (they call it "King Kong") in the make-your-own-rules Free Mode. Here, a few rocket-launcher-packing daredevils perch themselves on Rotterdam Tower (Liberty City's version of the Empire State Building) while the rest hop into choppers and try to blast them off the building. It's just one example of the limitless game types inventive players can whip up in Free Mode -- once they get over the initial, human-nature impulse to start blasting as soon as the game starts with all 16 players in a circle. But long before they resort to any DIY game design, players have plenty to keep them busy in the other modes. Even the expected deathmatch, Team DM, and race variants have that anything-can-happen GTA vibe. The objective-based Mafiya Work, Car Jack City, and Turf War modes demand teamwork and come across like an urban Battlefield 1942, with players in four-seat helicopters and cars adopting de-facto roles like navigator (continuously adjusting the GPS designator to follow objectives) or door gunner.
But my favorite modes are GTA Race, Cops 'n Crooks, and the co-op matches. GTA Race lets you make use of weapons, ditch your starting ride, and grab any vehicle around you...or just go it on foot. Fall behind early and you can adopt a scorched-earth strategy, building a roadblock and checking your ammo to make lap two a little more interesting. Cops 'n Crooks offers entertaining team-based play as a gang of crooks tries to get their boss to the extraction point before the police team takes out the head honcho. The three co-op missions stick your customizable character into standalone story-based levels complete with cinemas, massive firefights, and chases for up to four people (the other modes support 16). These missions are straightforward and enjoyable, and we expect to see more available as downloadable content for both systems in the future.
The single-player story itself delivers surprises and new gameplay quirks right up to the end (one late mission has you wrestling control of your car from an unwilling passenger -- a cool effect that at first had me thinking my controller was malfunctioning). The squirrelly driving control takes a while to master, as does the new shooting mechanic, which requires a half-pull of the left trigger for free-form aiming and is tricky in all-hell-breaks-loose shootouts. Shooting while driving is especially difficult but ultimately a rewarding system once you get the hang of it. Despite time-saving conveniences like a new in-car navigation system, post-mission retry prompts on your phone, and cab rides that skip lengthy trips, I do wish that Rockstar had added checkpoints in the multistage missions to cut down on the grunt work of frustrating retries. GTA4 also suffers from those little things that have always plagued the series, such as sudden pop-in of objects in the environment and the occasional repetition of car models in your immediate vicinity.
None of these little flaws take away from Liberty City's breathtaking vistas, incredibly varied scenery, and lived-in look (the PS3 version has the slightest visual edge, plus motion-control support -- but then it's missing Achievements and the eventual downloadable episodes exclusive to the 360 game). The city just feels alive. Mosey on foot for just a few minutes and you'll eavesdrop on the cellphone conversations of nearby pedestrians, witness cops arresting other criminals for a change, and even run into the random man on the street who will give you a mission or interact with Niko in some other special way. But more than just feeling alive, everything in this world is so integrated. Want to go on a Crazy Taxi-esque fare chase? Rather than stealing a cab and hitting a button, you borrow one of your cousin's cars and get dispatched. Or go the vigilante route by jacking a cop cruiser and accessing the police database, which clues you in to random crimes and the city's most-wanted list. Even things like stealing high-end cars and joining races happen through logical routes like e-mail and calls to the right people.
As well as factoring into missions, the game's multimedia features contribute to Liberty City's rudimentary society -- one that operates regardless of Niko's activities. Here's a for instance: While driving to an Internet café for a mission, one of my fellow reviewers heard a radio news story about a serial killer terrorizing the town. After clicking on a lawyer's webpage to set up a meeting, the reviewer got sidetracked surfing a MySpace parody site that had a banner ad for a blog-hosting service. Browsing the blogs revealed an entire history of posts from a disturbed individual who reveals himself to be the serial killer. Videogame worlds just don't get this deep.
But if I could add only one thing to this otherwise outstanding, breakthough sequel, I'd want the zanier toys from San Andreas. Maybe Rockstar thinks the series has gotten too serious for base-jumping parachutists and autoboosting nitrous oxide. But who's to say what's serious in a game where you can pick up your date in a stolen helicopter and she doesn't bat an eye? Fortunately, Rockstar seems open to adding features beyond the promised online episodes (360 version only). Something tells me this version of Liberty City, as exciting and beautiful as it is, is still under construction. Maybe Niko will get a few new shows for his American TV addiction, too.
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