By now most of you have read some of the extremely positive, perfect 10/10 GTA4 reviews by the gaming press. I'm not hear to tell you that GTA4 doesn't deserve high scores. It does, but is it really flawless? Not even close. The truth is GTA4 has plenty of faults that have haunted the series since the series first went 3D on the PS2. So instead of repeating every other review of the game, I've decided to focus on the problems with GTA4. Once again, GTA4 is an excellent and epic gaming experience, one that will definitely go down with the greatest, but there is always room for improvement.
To me, the bulk of the games problems can be summed up quite easily in the last mission of the game. It's the kind of mission that will force controllers to be thrown, and hair to be pulled out. Not because of it's difficulty, but because of game's various gameplay problems. When you finally finish it, you'll not only be glad it's over, you may never want to pick up the game again. Without going into spoilers here is a list of the problems with the last mission, that also happen to be the the weakest aspects of the GTA4 experience.
- No Checkpoints -
This is a biggie. GTA4 now allows you to restart missions almost instantly if you have failed them, which is a huge plus over the older games. The problem? You'll be playing all of these missions from the beginning every time, and if you died, with less ammo, armor, and money. This isn't a huge issue in the earlier, shorter missions, but once you are further in the game and you start playing missions that can take up to 20 or 30 minutes it becomes a major annoyance. This is partly because of the chaos of the GTA open world universe. After gunning down 30 or so criminals, and making an escape for it, you may be forced to loose your police wanted level. This can be either extremely easy, or frustratingly difficult depending on a lot of factors. Playing through an entire mission only to fail because of a stupid random accident is maddening. Particularly if your mission involves one of....
- Too many scripted Chase Missions (lack of variety)
- Ok, I understand that GTA4 is a bottom-line racing game. I mean Auto IS in the title. That doesn't change the fact that there are way too many chase missions. Sure there are some real stand outs, but in most cases these scripted events are too long and drawn out. In the past GTA games, most missions could be won by killing your target quickly. In GTA4 you are forced to continue the chase until a scripted event occurs. That means, if I am chasing some guy on a motorcycle and blast him with a rocket launcher, he will still get right up and keep riding until the game lets me kill him. This does give the game a more cinematic feel by allowing triggered events to happen, but if you do end up restarting the mission for the third time you won't be as excited to see a truck loose it's cargo in the street.
It's also fair to say that the game lacks variety in it's mission structure. Out of the 94 missions I completed, I would say only 20-30 of them were really memorable or different. Occasionally during a mission some cool and unique gameplay will pop up, but for some reason these are one-time only affairs. Why the developers didn't use these new gameplay ideas more often is baffling. Considering that the..
- Game is just TOO big for it's own good. -
This could be debated by many, but 40 hours in GTA4 is about 20 hours too long. Of course, that's how long it took me to beat the game, there is still a good 10-20 hours of gameplay left to be had. The story may start really strong, when Nico is a sentimental stranger, but soon after the games first big event, the story flatlines. You'll stop making friends, and start working for scumbags. While you are encouraged to hang out with the old gang now and then, the lack of missions with them actually weakens the overall narrative. When you do hang out, you'll be forced to do the same 5 things, which gets boring in the first few hours. You'll end up dreading hanging out with your needy friends and girlfriends. Not to mention the city is so large, eventually you won't even bother driving to pick them up. Taxi's are the game's greatest salvation, in an time conscious, oversized city. Driving becomes too monotonous to be fun. Which is kind of sad when it's the main gameplay mechanic. When things finally come to a close you'll probably hate these "friends" more then love them. The story conclusion also lacks the emotion and promise set up by the introduction for this very reason.
I didn't even mention the overly complex controls, buggy cover system, and numerous technical glitches. Mainly because they are much improved over the previous generation's iterations. GTA4 may not be the best racing, shooting, boating, action,drunk driving, dating sim, bowling, and online game, but the sum of it's parts greatly outweigh the negatives. It really is the best open world game ever created.
So after 40 hours in Liberty City, I am officially ready to take a vacation. Maybe I'll be back for the promised DLC, maybe not. I'm sure my friends will miss me a little more then I'll miss them.
My score: 9.4/10.0 - An Epic journey, weakened by it's own enormity and dated gameplay mechanics. Still a must buy/play.
PS - If you want to read everything that GTA4 does right click HERE