As someone who played GTA from its very first incarnation, I was completely blown away when I started playing GTA IV; for the first time in the series I felt like I was in a real, functioning city, with millions of people living their own lives independently of the player's character. I was amazed at the level of detail that went into the world, in terms of visuals, sound, and the "flow" of everyday life. Then, when I started actually playing the game in-depth, its flaws set in.
First of all, there's a tonal inconsistency; on the one hand, the story is an exploration of Nico's dark past, the hole Roman has dug himself into, and more, but simultaneously half of the in-game names and logos have a sexual joke or toilet humor and the talk radio stations are often similarly "wacky" (but still not as funny as the GTA III Chatterbox station).
As far as the gameplay goes, the whole "friendship simulation" aspect feels like a chore, especially when you have to do this with several characters, not just one, and it's mandatory in order to unlock missions (I stopped playing when I got to a point that there were no missions available because I didn't have a strong enough friendship with any characters to unlock more missions, and didn't want to spend who knows how many hours grinding to unlock them).
When you do get a mission, there usually seems to be only one way to complete it (ie in the mission where you have to kill Mikhail's daughter's boyfriend, you have to chase him on a motorcycle and then get into a gunfight with him an his gang in a park; you can't run him off the road with a car or truck, shoot him while he's driving, or defeat him using any other method), but the game doesn't tell you what that method is, resulting in trial-and-error gameplay and making it feel a bit like playing a level of Stuntman, except you're not allowed to read the script beforehand. Another issue I had was that several missions introduced a gimmick that was introduced in that mission and only used for that one mission, such as throwing a brick at a window, using a phone camera, or using a car wash.
Other gameplay issues that showed up include several of the first missions being a back-to-back series of tutorials, Nico making a phone call and casually strolling along after completing a mission (even when he's getting pelted by a fusillade of police or gang bullets), and the less said about how some of the vehicle types handle, the better.
Graphically, while the game may have overdone Real Is Brown a bit, the visuals were stunning and as a lifelong resident of the New York City area, I found this version of Liberty City to be a real dead ringer for many parts of New York City.
Despite all of these criticisms I must say I still found it an incredibly addictive and absorbing game, and a true landmark in the history of video games that shows just how detailed and immersive of a world can be created. That said, this game could have done with a revision that made that world more open-ended, with less grind.
A Flawed Classic
As someone who played GTA from its very first incarnation, I was completely blown away when I started playing GTA IV; for the first time in the series I felt like I was in a real, functioning city, with millions of people living their own lives independently of the player's character. I was amazed at the level of detail that went into the world, in terms of visuals, sound, and the "flow" of everyday life. Then, when I started actually playing the game in-depth, its flaws set in.
First of all, there's a tonal inconsistency; on the one hand, the story is an exploration of Nico's dark past, the hole Roman has dug himself into, and more, but simultaneously half of the in-game names and logos have a sexual joke or toilet humor and the talk radio stations are often similarly "wacky" (but still not as funny as the GTA III Chatterbox station).
As far as the gameplay goes, the whole "friendship simulation" aspect feels like a chore, especially when you have to do this with several characters, not just one, and it's mandatory in order to unlock missions (I stopped playing when I got to a point that there were no missions available because I didn't have a strong enough friendship with any characters to unlock more missions, and didn't want to spend who knows how many hours grinding to unlock them).
When you do get a mission, there usually seems to be only one way to complete it (ie in the mission where you have to kill Mikhail's daughter's boyfriend, you have to chase him on a motorcycle and then get into a gunfight with him an his gang in a park; you can't run him off the road with a car or truck, shoot him while he's driving, or defeat him using any other method), but the game doesn't tell you what that method is, resulting in trial-and-error gameplay and making it feel a bit like playing a level of Stuntman, except you're not allowed to read the script beforehand. Another issue I had was that several missions introduced a gimmick that was introduced in that mission and only used for that one mission, such as throwing a brick at a window, using a phone camera, or using a car wash.
Other gameplay issues that showed up include several of the first missions being a back-to-back series of tutorials, Nico making a phone call and casually strolling along after completing a mission (even when he's getting pelted by a fusillade of police or gang bullets), and the less said about how some of the vehicle types handle, the better.
Graphically, while the game may have overdone Real Is Brown a bit, the visuals were stunning and as a lifelong resident of the New York City area, I found this version of Liberty City to be a real dead ringer for many parts of New York City.
Despite all of these criticisms I must say I still found it an incredibly addictive and absorbing game, and a true landmark in the history of video games that shows just how detailed and immersive of a world can be created. That said, this game could have done with a revision that made that world more open-ended, with less grind.