GTA IV: First Impressions thread

[Atari5200]

sorry, compared to LCS, PSP version, this game is crap, once you get past the visuals and sound. the game mechanics itself are crap.

[Seob]

And then with the cops. I went to the internet place, and I aimed my gun at the person working the counter for them to run away, not sure why, I just like doing it. I then use the computer for a while. After about 10 minutes I notice a cash register on the other side and sure enough you can open it, however, I couldn't, I stood there for about 10 seconds getting ready to walk out and boom, wanted level..what the hell, my character didn't even do anything.

 

Didn't do nothing? Pointing a gun in someone's face is nothing? :-) I think the person at the counter did call the police. Like they would do in real life.

I agree with the cops, they're to many cops. Wish they had so much cops here in the netherlands. There wouldn't be any crime any more.

A little less cops makes the game better. But i still love the game. Just turn of you're phone and have fun.

[Atari5200]

well playing online alone is redeeming this game a little. At least I can go around doing whatever the hell I damn well please and there's no cops to bother me.

[+Random Terrain]

well playing online alone is redeeming this game a little. At least I can go around doing whatever the hell I damn well please and there's no cops to bother me.

Do you have full access to the city and is the city 'alive' with people and is there plenty of stuff to do?

[moycon]

well playing online alone is redeeming this game a little. At least I can go around doing whatever the hell I damn well please and there's no cops to bother me.

Do you have full access to the city and is the city 'alive' with people and is there plenty of stuff to do?

 

You have access to cars and all the people you want and lots of weapons laying around if you're in the Vs. mode. So you can definately cause any mayhem you want without fear of any cops showing up. Shoot a rocket and blow up a car, pile them together and blow up a bunch of cars if you want. Run around hitting folks with baseball bats. Think of it as Deathmatch against AI characters that don't really fight back.

 

I'll have to admit, It amused me for maybe 2 minutes.

[+remowilliams]

I'll have to admit, It amused me for maybe 2 minutes.

I also don't really understand the 'mayhem without interference' wish either. Yeah there are lots of cops in GTAIV, but WTF is the challenge in just mayhem if there are no consequences? People endlessly complained that the world wasn't 'real' enough, and 'the inhabitants don't respond to what's going on around them' in all the previous GTA games, and now they are complaining that the world is much more believable.

 

Anyhow, after finishing the game story line (and immensely enjoying almost every minute of the experience) I'm going back for some more gameplay and achievements and loving it. Still a solid 9 out of 10.

[Shannon]

If I had to rate it I'd give maybe a 7-8 out of 10. But then I'm no GTA expert either. This is the first one I even bothered messing with for more than two hours..

[bdog_147]

I'm up to near 40% complete in the story now. I still find the missions to be kinda meh. Now Iv'e been playing some of the multiplayer stuff and I think it's a lot of fun. Don't know if I'll spend much of my time with the online stuff but from what I have played online so far is a blast. Been playing with a guy from work, its fun to try to blast each other away,etc. Still sticking with my 7 out of 10 rating.

[+Random Terrain]

You have access to cars and all the people you want and lots of weapons laying around if you're in the Vs. mode. So you can definately cause any mayhem you want without fear of any cops showing up. Shoot a rocket and blow up a car, pile them together and blow up a bunch of cars if you want. Run around hitting folks with baseball bats. Think of it as Deathmatch against AI characters that don't really fight back.

 

I'll have to admit, It amused me for maybe 2 minutes.

Thanks. So can you also drive around the city and do cop missions or taxi driver missions or whatever little side missions they give you in the normal game?

[moycon]

Thanks. So can you also drive around the city and do cop missions or taxi driver missions or whatever little side missions they give you in the normal game?

 

You can drive around but no I do not believe you can do any of the side missions, taxi, steal exotic cars, hunt down fugitives, nothing like that. You also cannot go for any game achievements (Unless maybe they were multiplayer vs. achievements against other Live players and you invited them to the game) Like for instance there's an achievement for blowing up 10 cars in 10 seconds...you wont get it in the multiplayer mode, even if you do it I don't think. You can pretty much just run around and kill citizens. Believe me, it gets old quick. If you want to run around blowing shit up and killing stuff, there' cheaper, funner ways to do it on the 360.

[+Random Terrain]

Thanks. So can you also drive around the city and do cop missions or taxi driver missions or whatever little side missions they give you in the normal game?

You can drive around but no I do not believe you can do any of the side missions, taxi, steal exotic cars, hunt down fugitives, nothing like that. You also cannot go for any game achievements (Unless maybe they were multiplayer vs. achievements against other Live players and you invited them to the game) Like for instance there's an achievement for blowing up 10 cars in 10 seconds...you wont get it in the multiplayer mode, even if you do it I don't think. You can pretty much just run around and kill citizens. Believe me, it gets old quick. If you want to run around blowing shit up and killing stuff, there' cheaper, funner ways to do it on the 360.

Thanks. Looks like if I buy or rent this game, I'll have to deal with the cops the best I can with the cheats. I hope some new cheats are discovered.

[Atari5200]

Someone had asked if you stood on the top of a building and dropped gernades would it do anything, well I put that to the test last night with rocket launchers and sniper rifles. Needless to say some very interesting things happened.

 

#1. The world is actually 2 living worlds. One you can interact with and one you can't. The line is drawn by the amount of distance between you and your target. Standing on top of a building, large building, you can see the cars below, however, you cannot destroy them.

 

#2. Standing on a medium size building with a sniper rifle. Interesting....you can see the head lights and tail lights of the cars, they are basically dots because of how high you are, well, when you look through the scope...THEY'RE STILL DOTS..lol, just floating red and white dots everywhere, you can see pedestrians, but no cars. Also, things will appear and disappear, like trees, street lights, etc. It was very strange, where I was at must have been looking somewhere between both worlds, living and non-living, which is why I believe the cars didn't appear in the scope, but people would, and very few people, but none the less some pedestrians could be viewed and killed.

 

I ran into the 2nd world before in the normal game when I tried to shoot someone in the far blurred background on a bridge and couldn't figure out why the shots didn't go through nor did the person even run like normal. My test would seem to validate that there is only a certain amount of distance that you can take advantage of, it was quite disappointing I was looking forward to some nice sniping from the building tops, but alas, unless it's a short building, it can't happen.

Edited May 22, 2008 by Atari5200

[Shannon]

There are police fugitive missions. If you use the computer in the police car you can bring up a list of most wanted fugitives or something like that and then it will locate them for you.

[Atari5200]

i am having a blast playing by myself in multiplayer, last night after a bad day of work, I spent probably 30 minutes running over pedestrians at high rates of speed, watching them fly around, bounce of stuff, etc. I spent a lot of time flying the helicopter just flying around, weaving through buildings, and taking in the sites, just basically doing anything I want without any cops. I'm also taking the opportunity playing with no cops to fine tune my driving skills so when i start playing the story again, I will be able to corner and stuff better and better avoid accidentally hitting the hundreds of cops everywhere.

[moycon]

I am having a blast playing by myself

 

Better to play "by" yourself than play "with" yourself.

 

 

I suppose that would be a good mode to practice driving on for sure. I dunno if I'd have a blast doing it, but it would probably help my driving in the game (and I need it)

Edited May 22, 2008 by moycon

[Seob]

Since driving is more realistic you can't break and steer. Like in real life when braking hard and turning, your car will go straight forwards since lateral forces are pushing the car. Releasing the break will turn the car. That's just like in gtav iv.

[+Random Terrain]

Someone had asked if you stood on the top of a building and dropped gernades would it do anything, well I put that to the test last night with rocket launchers and sniper rifles. Needless to say some very interesting things happened.

Thanks for the info. That's disappointing. In GTA: SA all activity below would disappear when on a tall building as if you were the last man alive. I hoped they wouldn't just slap on a false second world that you couldn't interact with, but that's exactly what they did. I guess we'll have to wait for GTA V or GTA VI to get interactivity at a greater distance.

[+remowilliams]

I guess we'll have to wait for GTA V or GTA VI to get interactivity at a greater distance.

I've stood on top of a tall skyscraper and sniped people on the streets. The distance of the 'false' bit is much further out than previous GTAs. That being said when you are way high, you won't see the same amount of people/traffic that you would at street level.

[+Random Terrain]

I guess we'll have to wait for GTA V or GTA VI to get interactivity at a greater distance.

I've stood on top of a tall skyscraper and sniped people on the streets. The distance of the 'false' bit is much further out than previous GTAs. That being said when you are way high, you won't see the same amount of people/traffic that you would at street level.

Thanks.

[Atari5200]

i would watch how you define a tall building. I define 3 buildings, small, medium, and large, the large obviously being the sky scrapers, and I know for fact you cannot interact or anything on the top of the tall buildings and some of the medium ones.

 

When you do find a medium building you can snipe from it's pointless, for some reason all the pedestrians disappear except for 2 or 3. Plus you can't shoot any cars because they are just red and white floating dots. The small buildings, around 10 stories, are fine.

[kisrael]

i would watch how you define a tall building. I define 3 buildings, small, medium, and large, the large obviously being the sky scrapers, and I know for fact you cannot interact or anything on the top of the tall buildings and some of the medium ones.

 

When you do find a medium building you can snipe from it's pointless, for some reason all the pedestrians disappear except for 2 or 3. Plus you can't shoot any cars because they are just red and white floating dots. The small buildings, around 10 stories, are fine.

I still think people are too uptight about the cops and some other details in this game.

 

That said, there are some things that Crackdown does better, including "sniping from an insane distance". Crackdown is less ambitious than GTA4, and what it does it does very well.

[Atari5200]

Here's a fun little "bug" to try.

 

At the 2nd safe house, the one on the island with the strip club, get a 3 star or more wanted level by shooting cops coming into the entrance of the safe house. When you get a high wanted level. Go to the top of the first set of stairs and shoot the cops as they come through the door...then watch...lol, magical disappearing and reappearing cops, no cops then BLIP, there's a cop, then BLIP, he's gone. lol.

 

Also. I did a test, 5 tries at 5 different times of the day. I walked out of the safe house, fired a single round. 5 out of 5 times..wanted level. In the afternoon hours, I counted 8 cops on a single square block. most I've seen so far, but that is ridiculous.

 

Can you go in the arcade on the big island? I only found it playing multiplayer, haven't got to that point in single player.

[Artlover]

It's better then the previous GTA games, but it still leaves a lot to be desired.

 

Yeah, gfx is much better. Various animations are more detailed. But it's still basicly the same game with the same flaws.

 

I can knock down a freaking light pole with my bare hands, but the tinyest of trees will still bring a speeding garbage truck to sudden instant stop. Well, atleast I have a nice animation of being thrown through the windshield. Hookers actually do stuff to you now, but you can still kill them afterwards and collect less money then you gave them.

 

Plays kinda slow, driving is rather horrid at times, avoiding cops and clearing wanted level is way too easy.

 

Don't get me wrong, I like it, but when you get right down to it, it's still just GTA with slightly better gfx and more fluff. Tho, admittedly, some of the fluff is kool. I like just walking around and listening in on conversations of the NPC's. One was a chick at a pay phone talking about getting f'ed in the a'', absolutly hillarious. But in the end, it's still just GTA with more detail but little in the way of adding content. Well, ok, they added the friends/relationship crap (rather expanded since some of this was in GTA:SA)... Woopty f'in do. GTA isn't about taking your cousin bowling. You're the one with the cab company, Roman, take yourself bowling. I'm busy stealing cars and murdering hookers.

 

Oh, drunk physics. THAT is wild. Crazy fun trying to drive.

 

Probably the best GTA game out so far, but I still want more from it.

[Atari5200]

I can't even agree with that. I got about 40% and just stopped, I haven't gone back to it in months. Since probably my last post. As much of a fan I am of GTA, this game is terrible. It's too much like work to do the main game and to frustrating when this is a type of game that shouldn't be frustrating.

[kisrael]

I can't even agree with that. I got about 40% and just stopped, I haven't gone back to it in months. Since probably my last post. As much of a fan I am of GTA, this game is terrible. It's too much like work to do the main game and to frustrating when this is a type of game that shouldn't be frustrating.

I think "terrible" is overstating it, but you seem to like complaining as much as I seem to like complaining about complaining, so we'll call it even.

 

Just for grins I put on Vice City... I don't know if the 360 emulation is wonky or what, but I was AMAZED at how much worse it felt... running around seemed odd and sped up, the streets seemed practically empty, the driving physics were totally cartoonish and simplistic... I was in the "gee, GTA 4 isn't THAT much better camp" but I think actually going back to those earlier renditions is eye-opening.

 

The city would be cooler if Time Square was even more crowded, and there are too many "creep slowly through the building and kill every MFer in the place" missions, but over all this game is very, very good.