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