Grand Theft Auto IV is an Action-adventure, Open World game developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games, Capcom in 2008 for the Xbox 360.

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Overall 8.8    Graphics 7.5    Sound 8.3    Addictive 8.8    Story 8.5    Depth 8.8    Difficulty 6.5


Grand Theft Auto IV   supercool22

  Graphics 8   Sound 7   Addictive 9   Story 8   Depth 8   Difficulty 10
      Review Rating: 5/5     Submitted: 08-06-16     Review Replies: 1


GTA IV review   OrdannonsX

Grand Theft Auto IV. From this instalment on, things got a lot more cynical and serious. The satire and the dark humour is still there, but the craziness is gone. No skydiving, no stealing jets from military bases in the desert, and no more getting fat after too many pizzas from the Well-Stacked Pizza Parlor. GTA IV has a much more serious tone. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

The Graphics

The graphics, albeit quite dated now that GTA V is in stores, were amazing at the time. GTA IV raised the bar tremendously in terms of atmosphere and detail in open-world video environments. No avenue looks the same, the cars still look flashy (even when compared to GTA V), the cutscenes are some of Rockstar’s best since Max Payne 2… GTA IV just looked really good. Back in 2008. It’s 2014 now though, and the technically superior GTA V is out in stores. So yes, this game’s visuals have dated quite a bit. But that does not at all mean that GTA IV aged poorly. There’s still quite a lot of eye candy for your eyes to nibble on.

The Sound

GTA IV has the second-best radio station in the GTA franchise, in my opinion. The only instalment that got the radio station even better was, obviously, Vice City, which gave that game a huge 80s flair. Now, the radio station in GTA IV doesn’t come nearly as close to the perfect radio station from Vice City, but it’s still great. Every radio station has a fair balance between songs from big-name artists such as Queen, Kanye West and Elton John, to a lot of songs from lesser-known artists. Every radio station bring a distinctive vibe, all adding to Liberty City’s urban environment’s, and the storyline’s atmosphere. The sound effects are authentic and immersive, from the various car horns certain cars give off, to the vivid explosions and shots from firearms. Lastly, this game has one of the best main soundtracks ever made, in my opinion.

The Addictiveness

There’s a lot to love in GTA IV.  If you don’t feel like dealing with Niko’s problems for a while, you can decide to head out there and wreak havoc, in true GTA-fashion. Getting wasted (in laymen terms, that means getting killed) doesn’t result in you losing your weapons, so having some fun doesn’t result in many consequences. You can take various people you meet throughout the game on various trips, to befriend them and gain benefits from them. Your friends can also call you, even at the most inconvenient of times, but you can also put your phone on Silent (evil!!). There’s something about GTA IV which keeps me coming back, even after beating the game 100% and finishing the story several times. I still play GTA IV faithfully and GTA V is more or less collecting dust on my shelf at the moment, and I’m sure I can’t be alone on this (DISCLAIMER: I’m NOT saying GTA V is a bad game).

The Story

The story is among Rockstar’s best. You play as Niko Bellic, a Serbian war veteran, lured to Liberty City by letters from his cousin, Roman, who claimed to have made it big there. Also, it just so happens that there are some people Niko is looking for in that city… However, when Niko arrives off the boat in Liberty City, he soon notices his cousin isn’t quite living the dream he wrote about in his letters. Roman has been tormented by the Russian mafia, is in debt by Albanian loan sharks, and is addicted to gambling. Niko decides to stay and help his cousin out, but soon he gets pulled into the world. Niko came to Liberty City, hoping he could start a new life there, and avenge his team of fallen comrades in the war. But as Niko tries to move on, he can’t escape from his criminal past…

The Depth

The main storyline is quite lengthy. There’s one achievement you could pursue, called “Liberty City Minute”. This achievement requires you to beat the main storyline in no longer than 10 hours. Seeing as how this is a pretty tricky achievement to get says something about how long the storyline is. There’s quite a handful of guns to use, two of each class. There’s an in-game internet world which is bound to give you a few laughs, but you can also use it to read about certain important events you’ve been through in the game. During or after the main storyline, there are side-missions you can do like participating in street races, delivering packages of contraband, and the taxi and vigilante missions are back.

 

But I, too, have to jump on the bandwagon here, and speak my mind like a lot of disappointed fans had to at the time. There’s no customizing vehicles in this game, like in San Andreas. And that is pretty disappointing. What I also found a little aggravating was collecting GTA IV’s hidden packages. Every GTA game had different hidden packages to find. GTA III had contraband for you to find, Vice City had exotic tiki statues, and San Andreas did it differently, with placing graffiti tags around the map. GTA IV’s version of hidden packages are pigeons you have to shoot. Shooting these is funny the first ten times, but after that, it just becomes a chore. The only real reward you get after you find all these pigeons, is a combat helicopter. You get no rewards mid-way, like the previous games did. In GTA III and Vice City, finding so many hidden packages rewarded you, with a pistol at your safehouse, or a bodyguard you could call. It’s quite disappointing. Still, you’re bound to have a great time playing through GTA IV, and its online function. There are still people playing it online, you know. Great fun!

The Difficulty

Mission-wise, Grand Theft Auto IV is arguably one of the easier GTAs. It isn’t so much that the missions are much easier this time around, but that you don’t die very quickly like in previous games and in Grand Theft Auto V. I found that Niko is capable of taking a lot of punishment before he finally dies. Thereby comes that the enemy AI’s aim is so bad that they couldn’t hit a building when standing still. However, there are times when you might find yourself having a tough time. Occasionally. The cover system isn’t very reliable, since you might find yourself still taking hits somehow even though you’re positioned perfectly behind a wall. The vehicle physics are really heavy, too. It takes a long time to be able to corner effectively in cars. Lastly, mid-mission checkpoints wasn’t really a thing yet in Grand Theft Auto IV, so when you die during a mission, you respawn at the nearest hospital and have to start the mission over again from the beginning. Luckily, you’ll get a text message which gives you the option to restart the mission instantly, should you fail.

 

GTA IV was, and still is amazing. So maybe you can’t customize your cars anymore. That’s not really a big deal. What GTA IV gave us was something different. Something entirely new. Niko is an amazing main character, the city looks breathtaking, the story is really well-written, etc. If you haven’t played GTA IVyet, for some reason, you need to at least try it out. It’s brilliant.

Pros:

-          Niko is a brilliant main character

-          The story is engaging

-          Great level of detail

-          Best radio stations since Vice City

-          Quite realistic, for the people who are into that sort of thing

-          Fantastic original soundtrack

-          Playing online is good fun

-          Well fleshed-out in-game internet

Cons:

-          No customizing cars

-          Hanging out with friends isn’t as fun as you’d think

-          Shooting all 200 Pigeons is funny, but not very rewarding

  Graphics 8   Sound 8   Addictive 7   Story 9   Depth 7   Difficulty 4
      Review Rating: 5/5     Submitted: 03-30-14     Review Replies: 0


GTA IV Review   Popeye116
Grand Theft Auto IV is a very fun game. You play as Nico Bellic, a European immigrant who came to  Liberty City, America, with his cousin Roman. Roman looking for the American Dream, and Nico looking for revenge. The game is a great stress reliever, and I recommend you play it.Graphics: 4GTA IV definitely isn't known for its graphics. Helicopter blades go through walls, broken car parts are pixely, and more. Plus, buildings that you can't go into aren't good looking. Pretty much everything super close up doesn't look good. The graphics aren't completely awful, though. Some of the cars look cool, and the explosions are awesome. This is why I give the graphics of Grand Theft Auto IV a 4.

Sound: 8

Most of the sound effects in Grand Theft Auto IV aren't very note-worthy, but I've added a couple of extra points because of the radio. When you're in the car, you can listen the radio. There are twenty three different radio stations in this game. My favorites are Liberty Rock and JNR. All the stations combined boast over 125 songs. That's a whole lot of music for one game. It's fun in an odd way to shoot down cops and helicopters while listening to jazz. Then, there's the sound effects. The voice acting is OK in this game, but it could use some work. The sound effects that come from things such as explosions, cars, and guns are pretty normal in comparison to other games. I rate the sound of this game an 8.

Addictiveness: 9

Grand Theft Auto 4 is very addicting, and lots of this comes from the depth of the game. There's so much to do that you just want to play it more and more. There's many missions, and you want to unlock everything and beat it so you can have more fun. Plus, there's multiplayer, which can be addicting, too. This game is a good stress reliever, so if you come back from a crappy day at work or a boring school day, fire up GTA IV and unleash your wrath on virtual people. It's fun, and you aren't actually hurting anybody. Sadly, the addictiveness doesn't last forever. Soon, driving around shooting cops gets boring, and you're looking for every single way to have fun. This happened to me, and I stopped playing the game. Since the addictiveness doesn't last a super long time, that's why I give it a 9.

Story: 7

This game isn't known for it's story as much as it's other aspects, but It's still a pretty good one. You, Nico, start out with your cousin Roman running a taxi business after just moving to America. Somehow you get pulled into the criminal underworld, and next thing you know you're robbing banks and dealing with druggies and jerks. Throughout all this, Nico has one thing on his mind: revenge. I won't go into why or who he wants revenge with, because that would be spoiling the story. Altogether, though, Nico isn't THAT bad of a guy as it seems he is. He's just trying to survive in America. So, the story is pretty good. One thing that I liked was how you can choose how things happen sometimes. There will be parts where you can kill someone, or let them live, and it affects the story in some way. Near the end there are two very major decisions like these, and they completely change the story. Another minor story thing is the dating, where you can get a girlfriend and get perks from doing so, such as free clothes or free healing. This is sort of complicated to explain, so I'll skip it. The story, I give a 7

Depth: 10

There are so, so many things to do in this game. First there's the obvious; the story. The story is long, and gets you a good amount of gameplay. There's also side quests you can do, like assassinating people for money. Plus, you can hang out with friends and go on dates, like I mentioned in the story section. You can do stuff like boating, eating, drinking, racing, playing darts, going bowling (from Roman's annoying calls...), Pool, and more. If you do stuff with friends so much that they really like you, you can get great perks such as discounted weapons, free chopper rides, free taxi rides, and more. This gives you hours of fun and useful gameplay. Then there's the free roam. You can do so much stuff here, that you will get hours upon hours of fun. Drive cars off ramps, jump off the highest building, kill the police officers at 6 stars with cheats, mass kill pedestrians, blow up huge lines of traffic, get knocked off a motorcycle at high speeds, and more. There's so many things to do in free roam. Finally, Grand Theft Auto 4 has multiplayer. The multiplayer is pretty much the same thing as free roam, but with actual people. And there's not only that. You can do things such as Deathmatch, racing, Car Jack City, Cops n' crooks, Team Mafiya Work, etc. But I do admit, the multiplayer could have used some fine-tuning. With so many things to do in Grand Theft Auto IV, I give its depth a 10.Difficulty: 4

This game honestly isn't all to hard, ESPECIALLY if you use cheats. There are some missions that are super hard to get past, but most of them are rather simple. The cheats help make the game a lot easier, and I think it's good that they made the cheats harder to use in Grand Theft Auto V. The controls are pretty easy, too. One thing that isn't very good is the combat system, though. It's really easy for your punches to miss in this game. But with shooting, it's super easy, due to how it auto aims. The driving system is pretty easy, too, but it's sort of hard to go around corners without crashing. Plus, it's hard to get away from the police when they are 4 stars and up. All these factors are why I give the difficulty a 4.

Overall: 7.9

This game is very fun altogether. It's not too challenging, and there's a lot of things to do. And I mean a lot. The game is also super addicting, as is the story. Finally, while the graphics aren't pretty, the sound and radio definitely makes up for it. One other thing I think they should have added is a way to customize your cars, other than the randomized colors from the Pay "N  I definitely recommend you play this game if you haven't already. Overall, i give Grand Theft Auto IV a 7.9
  Graphics 4   Sound 8   Addictive 9   Story 7   Depth 10   Difficulty 4
      Review Rating: 4/5     Submitted: 07-20-14     Updated: 07-20-14     Review Replies: 9


Grand theft auto IV is outstanding.   nonameswereleft
Grand theft auto four is one of my favorite games ever. It had a great story line, graphics were good for its time, the sound was really good, and it had great voice acting. Grand theft auto 4 was extremely addicting, it took me months to beat the story, and I spent allot of time free roaming around the open world. The story was long, and engaging. It was great. You always felt like you were attached to the characters, and you always felt for the main character, because of the things he goes through. The depth of the game is really good, to. You have allot to do, and you always were occupied. Whether you were killing hoards of police, or you were going bowling, or playing pool, you always had something to do. The graphics were good, if you consider when it was released. The sound was decent, for its time. The game wasn't that hard, but it got me at some points. One of the most outstanding things is the euphoria game engine. You would never get bored of launching Niko off of his bike and watching him fly through the air with realistic physics. Also, if someone is near a railing, and you shoot them, they will fall off of it realistically. With rag doll physics, they wouldn't go over, they would just slump down.    If you haven't already, get this game. You won't be disappointed.
  Graphics 10   Sound 10   Addictive 10   Story 10   Depth 10   Difficulty 8
      Review Rating: 3/5     Submitted: 06-01-14     Review Replies: 4

What does the American dream mean today? For Niko Bellic, fresh off the boat from Europe, it is the hope he can escape his past. For his cousin, Roman, it is the vision that together they can find fortune in Liberty City, gateway to the land of opportunity. As they slip into debt and are dragged into a criminal underworld by a series of shysters, thieves and sociopaths, they discover that the reality is very different from the dream in a city that worships money and status, and is heaven for those who have them and a living nightmare for those who don't.

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