Welcome to the 21st century (GTA IV impressions)
Grand Theft Auto IV is, from all accounts, a truly massive game with literally hundreds of hours of play locked inside, so after playing for two hours this morning I feel completely confident in giving you some rock solid impressions.
First of all, I’m playing on the 360. I haven’t noticed any significant texture pop-in issues. There is some pop-in, but all the stuff I’ve noticed is low textures changing to higher resolution textures while watching. It’s slightly annoying, but these things are something we’re going to have to get used to with this generation of consoles. Hopefully the next generation will have enough onboard video memory to fix that stuff.
I’m surprised to read that some of the people whose opinions I generally agree with are down on this game; take, for instance, Bill Harris’s impressions at Dubious Quality or Tom Chick’s impressions at Quarter to Three. I’ve only put in two hours at this point but I am already feeling very positive about the game.
The jump to new consoles is the most readily apparent advantage of this version. The increase in visual fidelity does wonders for the series. It doesn’t hurt that every environment that I’ve been in so far feels much more vibrant and alive; not only is the attention to detail much greater in terms of the density of objects, but there also seem to be a lot more cars and people on the street. It feels much more like NYC (excuse me, LC) than any of the previous games. The only way I can describe the way the game looks is to compare it to delicious moist cake. Take that as you will.
The fact that your character walks at all times is great. Character movement is an oft overlooked mechanic, and I love the ability to walk without immediately moving into a jog or run when you’re using the right stick. In most games your character walks only when the analog is barely pushed, but here running requires holding down or tapping A while pushing on the analog. It’s a good change.
The driving physics feel just as fine as the previous versions. The cellphone seems to be a great addition. The dialouge is suprisingly cogent, and the characters (so far) are interesting enough to keep my attention. In a game with cutscenes, that is a big win, because I despise cut scenes with every fiber of my being. But I can live with them in this game, because they are short and skippable (at least after having seen them once).
As a final note, I realize that I’ve made a big mistake by starting the game now, as I have another game I have to review. So basically I won’t be able to play anymore GTA until I’m done with that review. It’s possible that GTA IV has performed some sort of fatality on me (addictionality?). I think that’s quite a compliment.