Disclosure: I am writing this review in June 2015, just a little over 7 years after the game’s original release on April 28, 2008. In this review I am not granting the game mercies by forgiving it for its age because anybody reading this review is likely doing so because they are considering coming to game long after its release like I did. That being said, my review will mostly focus on the story and game play mechanics rather graphics and other technical aspects of the game.
Grand Theft Auto: the franchise where you murder prostitutes and policemen alike, run over pedestrians, and perform other empty, meaningless acts of crime, right? That’s what I always thought of the franchise anyways, until I found myself going back through old Giant Bombcasts and listening to Jeff, Ryan Davis, Brad, and Vinny regale the game for it’s life-like open-world and moving story. I tend to fall in line with their opinions in most cases, so when I saw that the Humble Store was selling GTA IV and the Episodes from Liberty City (which I am not taking into account in this review) for only $6 I had to check it out. This game is so large that I don’t think I can faithfully discuss every aspect of it, so I will discuss a handful of its major components: graphics and mechanics, the open world, social simulation, side-missions, story (and main missions).
GTA IV is an old game. I’m not going to beat around the bush trying to forgive it for its age. If you are one to count pixels, watch frame rates, and zoom in on textures then be warned: this game isn’t gorgeous compared to what we have today. On my part it looks just fine (running default settings on a 1080p from a Late 2013 Retina MacBook Pro – 16GB RAM, SSD, NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M – not exactly a gaming monster, but it still ran just fine because it’s so old), so if you’re concerned about how it looks in it’s age, fear not, it’s just fine. Now it’s mechanics, on the other hand, warrant a bit more discussion. GTA IV plays pretty rough. I’m typically not a fan of third-person games even when they play well, and GTA IV does not play well. Period. Movements requiring any degree of nuance are nigh impossible. Aiming feels very muddy especially when behind cover. Cars drive like they all weight 5 tons except the motorcycle which drives like somebody attached a jet engine to a street bike and plopped it down on an iced-over road. Only a few hours into the game, I found myself in a pattern of enjoying the game more when I was “playing” it less. By this I simply mean that the vast majority of shootouts and car chases (most of the plot points of most of the missions) were unpleasant to play. This unpleasant feeling continued throughout the entirety of the game, and (unfortunately) was a defining characteristic of the experience for me, steadily increasing throughout the game as the missions became more and more combat-intensive.
The open world of GTA IV is Liberty City, the New York City of the GTA universe. This city features three main burrows which very greatly in socioeconomic standing, population, architecture, and overall atmosphere (think poor district, business district, rich district). There are many different radio stations all playing different music and featuring satirical commercials, a variety of different-looking NPCs roaming the streets, and a large number of buildings you can move in and out of without entering a load screen. From a distance this world looks pretty nice, but as you take a closer look you start to cracks in the surface. The random, inter-NPC speech is completely broken. One of my favorite “conversations” overheard was something along the lines of
“Have you seen the real estate prices around here? Ridiculous!”
“What?!?”
*awkward pause*
“I don’t know how that new bill got passed.”
“Ok.”
If the conversation isn’t a hilariously disjointed mess then it’s either a guy making strange comments about female body parts or everyday pedestrians getting scared and saying very crass things in an awkward, disingenuous thug/gangster tone. Aside from speech, the NPCs show other flaws: when driving they often behaving chaotically (side-swiping other drivers and things of that nature) and on the streets they don’t before predictably (chasing after you and looking for a fight after you car-jack them at gunpoint rather than running for safety as a normal person might). From a more technical standpoint, vehicle fade-in is a large immersion-breaking problem.
Social simulation? It’s boring. That’s about all I have to say. It’s really boring. You can play darts or pool/billiards, go bowling, see a comedy show, grab some dinner, take a helicopter tour, or hang out at the strip club all while listening to strangely-timed and meaningless conversation between the characters. I was not moved to engage in these activities any more than what was required by the game for missions and to keep “reputation” levels with the main characters friendly.
Each main character (friend) you come across can give you side missions once your relationship has progressed enough. These are all repetitive missions including a variety of deliveries, hits, and other crime-related activities. Upon completely all the side missions for a particular person, an upgrade or special ability is unlocked that can make the game easier or more convenient moving forward. These missions often provided me a good break from the grind of the main story lines despite being a little repetitive.
Finally, the story. After hearing the Bombcast crew’s opinions there was one and only one thing I was looking for in GTA IV: a story. I heard the game praised for telling a believable and emotionally impactful tale: the story of Niko Bellic, a poor immigrant and ex-soldier who’s come to the States to escape his life of violence only to find himself continuously wrapped up in death, crime, and tragedy. How sad? Right? For me the story did not live up to the expectations that had been placed. Where others saw misfortune, I saw karma. In my eyes Niko Bellic is a violent, remorseless criminal, and I was not convinced that he truly wished to escape his past (present?) life. This feeling hit home for me in a scene where he kicks a mechanic in the stomach for ignoring him; it takes place in a relatively meaningless, unimportant cutscene but to me displayed a hardness to violence toward the innocent that gives Niko little chance of redemption. Granted, even that viewpoint still tells a story. It is perhaps a different story than Rockstar wished to tell, but it’s a story nonetheless. A story that while not necessarily emotionally moving, still intriguing enough to keep me wanting to know more until the end. The missions that followed what I consider the main story lines were overall good, mostly cut from a different cloth than the more monotonous side missions; I especially enjoyed the missions with the McReary family and the United Liberty Paper contact. However, the bog of sloppy combat and driving mechanics occasionally left me rushing through missions and getting stuck in repeated failures that I couldn’t help but feel were not my fault as the game is pretty easy when the mechanics aren’t causing you to fumble.
Despite all the shortcomings of this game, my experience was overall a positive one. The intrigue of the story kept me slogging through the muddy gameplay and quickly repetitive world without too much trouble. However, anybody looking to play this game in (or after) 2015 should know that it has many flaws inherent to its age. This is why I’ve decided to give Grand Theft Auto IV three of five stars.