Continuing from the Part One of the GTA IV Review….
Keep your other friends happy and they will provide you with guns/ammo and what not. I am pretty sure you must be wondering how boring it would be to hang out with an AI friend in a video game. Well my real living friend, it’s damn fun. You are given the usual (boring) option of going to a fast food joint for food, but the other options like strip club, bar, stage shows and comedy club are the insanely addictive and motivating options here. I say motivating because when you are hanging out with your friends, you will finally take an initiative to check these joints out.
Now c’mon, it’s better to be visiting these places with a friend (even though it’s all not real/virtual) rather then going alone you lonely slob, in-game off course! The strip club does make a return, with the power of next-gen consoles the strippers look absolutely uh… next-gen. When you are visiting the Strip Joint with a male friend (Female?! Where are your manners?), he will be hanging out while you can ask one of the strippers to go to the private rooms where she will be giving you a personal lap dance. Ask for more Lap Dances and things get hotter. I tell you, even Jack Thompson won’t mind jacking off to that lap dance!
If strip joint ain’t your thing, then you can take your friends to the comedy club or for a show. Oh! and how fun are these places. When you enter these places with a friend, a new cut scene takes place. In the comedy club we have an actual stand up comedian, sometimes the act can take a lot of time. Even the stage shows are damn fun and you see a different show every time you visit a place.
Now tell me, how often do you see developers take so much care to ensure that the task you are carrying out doesn’t get mundane and remains enjoyable throughout. My personal fav though has to be the bar. No doubt, that we have encountered drunkards in games before, the only problem was that they stood still while the camera turned dizzy while GTA IV has the best representation of a character being drunk EVER.
When Niko does get drunk, he moves in a very erratic manner loosing his balance continuously. He falls on anything he encounters, whether it be cars or pavements that are one inch high or even garbage bags, yes them God DAMN garbage bags. The physics Niko displays when he is drunk, is like watching music in motion! This is still tip of the iceberg.
This time the main city is Liberty City that makes a comeback from GTA III. It’s a more detailed and accurate version of New York City with its four boroughs with fictional names like Broker, Dukes, Bohan and Algonquin. Adjacent to it is an independent state which resembles New Jersey and is named Alderny. Early on in the Game you won’t be able to visit these places because there is a terrorist threat because of which the bridges are blocked but as you progress through the game, these locations become accessible to you.
Each location has a distinctive look to it duh! What makes the game so special is that how much detail has been displayed throughout the City. If Assassins Creed had shopkeepers, beggars, guards etc. GTA IV has junkies, cops, construction workers, beggars. People talking on mobile phones, reading papers, reading books, drinking coffee, eating candy bars, buying groceries or shopping or going for work carrying a suitcase.
Let me…catch….my breath. It’s still not over, the city is absolutely buzzing with life and Rockstar has left absolutely no stone un-turned to give an accurate description of the city. Things might surprise you, you have roads blocked off with Liberty City officials working at the site. People sweeping the streets to keep them clean, junkies saying the most absurd but insanely comical things you have ever heard. Beggars sleeping on alley ways or deserted areas.
At night time you have the municipal officials disposing off garbage trucks to clear off the garbage. If you visit the “Statue of Happiness” (based on Statue of Liberty), you see tourists taking photographs, explore more and you will stalls where post cards are being sold. The detail is absolutely astounding. That’s not the end of it, visit parks and you might find gramophone being played by some guy to earn money, you can god damn spare some money to him too. Even beggars at times ask you for money.
Industrial sites have the thud sound of some sort machine working in the background, at night you have guards, guarding these places. At night they are guarding most of the offices or malls. Heck speaking of malls, if you make your way to the back side, you will see loading docks filled with merchandise for the mall. If that’s not enough, go to a rich residential area and you see garbage bags laid out for the municipal officials.
Not only residential places, even outside shops. All these are physical objects/props that you can drive over. That’s not all, make your way to a park during the early hours of the morning and you will see people jogging. The weather also changes at times. Sometimes it’s really foggy and you cannot see objects at a distance but if you see a car with the headlight on, a very cool blur effect is seen.
Even when it rains, the it looks absolutely astounding with the floors getting a wet look. Simply Fantastic! The water too is amazing, it is wavy and looks damn gorgeous, giving amazing reflections of the city and bridges. At night time, the water gives a beautiful reflection of the city as it is filled with light and during daytime you see the Sun giving an amazing effect on the water.
At ports, you might see chunks of wood or garbage floating on the water. Seeing how it floats with the motion of the water is just amazing. Swimming under water is not an option any more though. The game still doesn’t cease to impress. Along with the physics, the killing mechanism has also been improved a lot. Imagine the work done here, shoot someone in the feet and he will try to balance himself, because of the uncontrollable pain he might even shoot his gun mindlessly.
GTA has somewhat redefined how bodies are meant to die in games. If the guy you shot isn’t dead, you will see his body shaking and moving. After sometime, you see the person get up and walk “away” from the scene in last ray of hope. If you notice him going away, just shoot him again. Once you do that, you see Niko scream “I told you to stay down!” or if you are still irritated with the body crumbling in pain, just shoot it at its head and it will die and quick death. GTA IV makes killing “fun” and we absolutely hate saying that.
The physics too have been improved a lot. Along with all physics capable props like the garbage cans etc. Every individual in Liberty City reacts in a very realistic human like manner. Drive faster and bang into an individual and he will fly farther displaying precise human physical properties. Niko displays them too! Like while driving a car, drive head on into another vehicle, if the speed is right then Niko will bash through the wind shield and fly in the air in a very lifelike manner.
The cars are no different, they look amazing and drive very realistically. With the power of better hardware, the heart of GTA, i.e. the driving has come to life. The cars take realistic damage with individual components breaking off in exactly the manner you damage them. When you do start the game, the handling might seem a little too wobbly. An Hour into the game though will see you handling your rides better than Michael Schumacher.
The game might have stripped down, not in terms of quality but in terms of difficulty. With the inclusion of a Gears of War like cover system, gunfights seem a lot easier and enjoyable than before. We are also given the option to blind fire which is makes it even more easier. The aiming system is very crisp and enjoyable. Car jacking makes sense too this time, unlike previous GTA Games where all cars were open.
This time, we actually break into them. If a car is locked, you look around and break the window with your elbow and put your hand in to open the door, after you are in, you are supposed to hot wire the car and after which only will you be able to drive. If you are unlucky, the car might have an alarm system and will alert any cops around, though it dies out after sometime. A very nice realistic look to it. It’s easier to loose the cops in this GTA with a radius like system, stay out of the radius for sometime and your wanted level will cool down. Even the driving has been made easier.
Along with way points, the map also gives you the shortest path to your destination by highlighting it in the map. Even then, if you were ever unhappy about the free roam that GTA has, you can just hop in a taxi and ask you to take it to any destination you want, yes any destination you want in the map. Later on you might even get an option to ride a chopper. The options are limitless, the more you explore, the more you get!
With a very well written single player campaign that will last you nearly thirty hours or more. With nearly thirty hours of missions that never get boring at any given time. There is no doubt, GTA IV is an experience not meant to be missed. In the end, we have a game that pushes the boundaries of virtual reality and free roaming genre to its limit. It might takes week to actually know what more this game has it offer and we only spent a few days with it. It’s hard to imagine, what the next franchise will bring forth.
- By Akshay Singh