Grand Theft Auto 4 First 5 missions preview

[vegas-voss]

http://www.gta4.net/missions/

[hughesie27]

I read one of the previews in a magazine and it said that during one of their multiplayer matches they were playng the mode where you need to get manny escuela i think from the airport to some safe house with the SWAT after you. It starts of with you at the airport and he jets in on a plane but won't get off until you have got rid of the first waves of SWAT guys. Then it's up to you what you do next. They got a couple of them into a car including Manny (there are 4 people you play it with). With no idea where the other 2 were they set off while getting shot it from the SWAT. The passenger in the car broke his window and began firing back however it was no real match to the armoured SWAT van. That was until out of no where hell from above kicked into gear! The 2 missing members of the team drop in on the huge helicopter we seen in the trailer 4 with a powerful minigun on the bottom as the other guy in it's passenger seat hung out of the window with his AK-47. They thought it was probably a good idea to take the Helicopter while the other 2 were getting Manny into the car.

[hughesie27]

After all the hype that follows teaser trailers, magazine previews and internet reports, it's too easy to forget that at the centre of the noise is, well, a Grand Theft Auto game. With the same GTA formula we've been happily playing for years.

 

That's not to say GTA IV is old-hat - far from it. But in the unprecedented event of being lobbed an Xbox controller and left to roam Liberty City unchained, we knew exactly what to do. Which was basically to steal a car, run over a pedestrian and outrun the police for ten minutes until we got nicked by a bobby hiding behind a tree.

 

It's still awesome; flying over walls from (poorly) hidden ramps to outrun the police, and rocket-blasting cop helicopters is just as fun as it was in 2003. After two hours of intensive hands-on, the question is no longer "does GTA IV re-write the urban crime genre?" but, "does it blow away San Andreas?" The answer clear and simple - yes it does.

 

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Controller in hand and game un-paused, the very brown-clothed Niko appears on screen, in our control for the first time. We're still knocked back by how fantastic everything looks - only this time there are no smoke and mirrors clouding our vision, and no handcuffs preventing us from peeking around the corner.

 

First thing's first; despite our concerns the framerate is absolutely rock solid. We're on a fairly busy street corner in Broker with cars, pedestrians and the massive cityscape looming on the horizon. It's all good.

 

Rockstar North hasn't been stingy with the effects either. Immediately we notice lovely motion and depth of field effects when locking on to targets (with the left trigger). There's also some bizarre but pleasant field-of-view "fisheye" mischief going on when you move the camera at an angle underneath or above Niko (making the distance between characters and the background look further - sounds strange but works).

 

The lighting system in particular looks fantastic. Some of the game's scenery and textures can look a bit rough around the edges in screens. But, in motion, the scale and detail of Liberty City is impressive. It feels just like a GTA city; pedestrians scatter and the sound of gun fire, the odd hidden ramp lurks behind low walls and comedy ad signs are never far away.

 

The mission we're on (Jamaican Heat) is early in the game and tasks Niko to pick up drug-dealing Jamaican gunman Little Jacob from his pad.

 

 

Stealing cars with the Y button is as simple as ever. The most noticeable difference from San Andreas is a strong feeling of weight behind the world, as demonstrated by the poor fellow flailing and rolling on the floor as Niko ejects him from his vehicle.

 

Euphoria Physics - the stuff powering LucasAarts' Force Unleashed game - is the tech to be thanked for this. It might not sound like a big deal, but because of how massively un-interactive and well, rigid the environments were in the PS2 instalments, it's incredibly liberating to see pedestrians fall over, cars bump in the road and scenery roll and collide realistically when hit.

 

The biggest impact of GTA's new-found physics is probably in the vehicle handling, which now feels far more realistic and affected by the world around it. By luck, we found the best car to test this out right on the street where we started; a completely rusted, half-burnt out old banger.

 

After happily evicting its previous owner (who was probably pleased to get some fresh air) we sped off down the road only to slam into the pavement, as the handling of the car was being skewed towards the dodgy wheel on our left hand side.

 

As with the walk and run animations of each character, vehicles can be seen bouncing and bopping with every bump in the road. This sense of gravity helps the world feel a lot more alive than previous Grand Theft Autos.

 

In this botched-up motor we had to battle with the analogue stick to keep it in a straight line, and the burst tyre on our side had a massive effect in how the vehicle handled. It's obvious that car damage is hugely more important in this GTA than in San Andreas.

 

Realism is a strong theme in IV's driving. It's much more difficult to simply right-angle around a corner at speed. You can't rely on the handbrake to spin you around a turn, and if you don't want to be sent into the side of a building by a bump in the road, you have to slow down.

 

 

It's still fun - perhaps even more so when you bugger up and do a barrel-roll into a hotdog stand - but as our extended play taught us, the gap between low and high-end cars is much bigger in the control department. Watch those corners!

 

OK Computer

Back to our first point; GTA IV is still very much a Grand Theft Auto experience. But it's impressive how Rockstar has built up and over San Andreas' design.

 

Driving to Little Jacob's place is a painless and far smoother experience than it would've been in GTA III. Analogue acceleration on the triggers makes cruising around the streets a breeze. The new GPS waypoint system, which draws a line through the map to your destination, is executed perfectly.

 

Even little Jacob himself, who comes scuttling out of his pad smoking a funny cigarette, is a far less sterile character than the blocky blokes of old. We stop mid-run on our way to the next destination, a meeting point where Jacbo's about to make a dodgy deal, realising that like old GTA's we'd better get into a car and take the Jamaican along. But much to our surprise there he is running behind us, still puffing away mind.

 

Once in the car Jacob carries on talking for minutes (there's shed loads of non-plot-centric dialogue) and even his "cigarette" smoke drifts realistically out of the window.

 

It's still far from genius AI, but little bits like this are certainly far ahead of III, which had slightly dim-witted friendly and enemy AI to say the least.

 

Eventually we make it to our destination; a dodgy back alley where Jacob wants us to keep watch over his shady deal. A hovering halo, similar to that in previous games, indicates where we should go; a ledge overlooking the alley.

 

Clicking the left analogue stick has Niko crouch, and the three arriving dealers are completely unaware of his presence - which means we can get the first shot off when the deal inevitably goes sour.

 

 

Immediately the scene explodes into something far more frantic than any of San Andreas' simple lock-on blasting. All parties dive into cover, taking blind pot shots over dumpsters.

 

Aiming and shooting has been handled in quite a unique manor from your average third-person shooter. Holding down the left trigger locks on to a target, and you can cycle through targets using the right stick.

 

From here you can shoot at an enemy's arms, legs, chest or head - but it's not totally automatic. The cursor is locked on to the centre of a target's chest, and from there you can move your aim with the right stick inside a small circle radius around the target.

 

This way a headshot actually requires some skill; simply holding up with the right stick shoots over the bad guy's head, so you have to hover slightly to nail him in the face.

 

The genius of this system is that proper free-aiming is also instantly accessible by holding the trigger half-way in, allowing you to aim your gun freely where ever you like. This proves useful when a hitman bursts from the rooftop above us.

 

This is also (yet another) example of Euphoria physics at work, we nail him and watch him tumble across the rooftop before grabbing and swinging from the ledge in a last ditch effort to stay alive.

 

The much-welcomed cover system works (and looks) great. Once we'd dealt with the psycho dealers, it was off to find their shotgun-wielding mates, with the purpose of putting and end to it.

 

Taking cover underneath window ledges and at the side of doors is painless and intuitive. Tapping the right bumper slams Niko into cover (Gears of War style). If you're a bit far off he'll dive or floor-slide. Jumping between cover is just as simple as in Epic's shooter. Niko was never stuck in a place we didn't want him to be.

 

 

Shooting feels slightly different from what we're used, but at the same time delivers a new dynamic. One trigger performs simple blindfire shooting, while the other pops Niko out of cover for full-on gun pointing.

 

The difference here is that the aiming reticule is on screen even when you're behind cover, and to fire consecutive shots you have to hold the right trigger down, as letting go sends you right back in to cover.

 

This way you're never out of cover when you're not shooting, and the hop 'n bop blasting gameplay is even more simplified. Thankfully, as is emerged in this impressively detailed living room (complete with couch, telly, cockroaches), Niko can shoot through scenery and blast cover to bits.

 

Plasterboard falls apart with every shot and enemy gangbangers are accessible to your ammunition behind most objects. This new combat adds greater depth to the bullet ballet of GTA IV, which is bound to supply some absolute standout action sequences when the final game arrives.

 

Lights, camera, ACTION!

The third and final most important layer we discovered is GTA IV's remarkable knack for a bit of cinematic flair. Our next mission takes Niko to meet some Russian mafia types in a shady Broker nightclub, where he's been called in for a chat.

 

The Russian head honcho is slouched in a smoky corner with female company, which he soon dismisses upon Niko's arrival. Character animation is top-notch. It's alomst like the rigid robots with square hands of San Andreas never happened.

 

So Russian's having trouble with the police, after the feds somehow discovered the shady deals they've been doing in Liberty City. Despite pleas from his subordinate, Dimitri, the boss is convinced the squealer is his right-hand-man's brother-in-law, and Niko's been hired to shut him up.

[hughesie27]

The killing has earned us a further two stars (that's three - the highest we managed in our hands-on time) and the familiar coppa choppa quickly appears above our heads - the perfect excuse to park up and play with the rocket launcher.

 

 

Explosions in GTA IV are stupidly destructive and absolutely massive - on the same scale as Crackdown's multi-car-flinging booms. Smoke trails realistically as car doors and debris are flung through the air. Even pedestrians who escape the initial blast are usually left on fire, running around like big, fiery Guy Fawkes.

 

There's also a slight heat-seeking function to the rocket launcher. When we fired it at a near-by cop for example, it swerved up and behind him, favouring the police car instead as a more worthy target. This made nailing the chopper even easier, which comes smoking and exploding down to the street in a twisted mass of metal and flame.

 

Although our star level is the same, the resulting chaos kicks off a massive game of hide and seek, with cops, minus their eye in the sky, frantically searching for us.

 

In GTA IV when you're out of sight from the law your stars will 'grey out', indicating that you're hidden. Unfortunately this doesn't work like the big game of peek-a-boo we expected, and even when you're hidden the cops are slowly drawn to your general location.

 

Eventually the law tracks us down to the dark alley we're parked in. Locking on to cover and whipping out the AK, we frantically take out as many as possible, but they've called in a second police helicopter and it's time to leg it or be shot to pieces by the new chopper's on-board mini-gun.

 

Eventually we make it to a small canal, where most of the on-foot bobbies seem to have lost our scent. It's just us and the helicopter now, but with no ammunition left for the RPG we pull out the next best thing; the sniper rifle.

 

The rifle works in pretty much the same fashion as before, but what impressed us most was the amount of detail you can pick out down its scope.

 

Lining up with the chopper above us - which is now spraying bullets liberally in our direction - we can make out the gunner actually sitting inside. We take him out and smile as he plummets to the ground in a single shot.

 

 

Now that its defenceless we're free to aim up and take out the pilot as well. Shooting right through the glass we perform yet another one shot kill, and the helicopter bucks violently downwards, exploding in the canal.

 

GTA has always been about the randomness, the wide-open battles and sheer chaos you can cause. We're delighted to see that GTA IV hasn't forgotten it routes. At the very least the fourth game will provide a bigger playground, louder explosions and probably the most epic and engaging shootouts we've ever had in a game.

 

Underneath the litres of polish and great combat additions, IV controls and feels just like a GTA game. But as we've said, that's no bad thing at all. Multiplayer details next, please Rockstar.

[hughesie27]

http://uk.xbox360.ign.com/articles/863/863435p1.html

[Sconnie]

Cheers Brashy and Hughesie, this game will rival Vice City as the best game ever made.

[Tams bird]

Only read this thread because the office bores talk about this sort of thing all day. Who has the biggest gigabites etc. Must have small other things. They are in there 30's at least....One says only time he is out is at work. Dosnt surprise me. Took a week of work one time for a online war games thing.

[hughesie27]

http://www.gta4.net/news/index.php

 

another trailer video

Look at those water effects and the drunk scene!

[jamboinheaven]

hueghsie u r boring

[Sconnie]

hueghsie u r boring

 

Everything he's posted in this thread would interest most GTA fans. If you don't like it, don't read it.