MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

re: MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

hage — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 15:45:18 GMT

This is an excellent discussion, and a commendable one to be having.

I found myself most tuned in with this opinion of Totilo's:

<i>"We know that the only thing more impressive than the amount of polish Rockstar applies to each new cityscape of urban delinquency is the amount of these games that remains un-polished. The GTA games are incredible in scale and detail, deft in their portrayal of freedom's limits, aurally grand and as entertainingly violent, disruptive and calamitous as any games before them. Still, each game of the series pokes their players with rough edges: missions of awkward difficulty, controls that improve but can still frustrate, characters who don't seem consistent."</i>

While he took it in a different direction than I did, for me, coming into the game from the perspective of someone who played a couple hours of GTA3 and a couple hours of Vice City, deciding in both cases that the unpolished open-ended sandbox game was just not for me. I gave GTA4 another shot because this one was supposed to be different. This was the GTA with a fascinating story, that roped you in with impressively fleshed out characters and kept you playing in much the same way that a great JRPG would. What I got was a disappointment.

Whether GTA4 succeeds as a sandbox game or not is not something I can render judgment on. As the story-driven single-player epic action game it is purported to be, I found it to be a failure. Among other gripes, I found the driving mechanic tedious and awkward and the mission structure to force asinine amounts of repetition on the player. These were complaints I had with the GTA3 and I was fairly shocked that they remained in this installment. I also found the story to be a fraudulent bill of goods, between the laughable artifice in some of the NPCs (Michelle after 10 seconds in the car: "I'd really like to get to know you better, Niko...") and every time the writers build up a little good will in terms of your emotional investment in Niko they squander it on something completely out of character in the name of a violent filler mission.

This is, as I understand it, not necessarily out of the norm for GTA, but once again, this one was supposed to be different. While I don't doubt that, in a way, this is the best GTA yet, it is still unquestionably GTA, and for this player, it was banished to the shelf after a few hours alongside its predecessors.

re: MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

Marijn — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 17:39:18 GMT

The entire game should have been more like the Marnie mission. That was the only part of the game that really left me shaken; it was in-character for Niko, who tried to convince Marnie to give it up, but didn't succeed; it perfectly fit the tragic tone that the game was striving for; it didn't make its subject matter glamorous. If the entire story had succeeded in hitting that tone; if it had given Niko better motivations to cross his own moral boundaries; if it had sketched all its side characters as believably as poor Marnie, than Rockstar would have better reached their goal of creating a more mature GTA, a goal which I wholeheartedly support.

I don't think releasing DLC that makes content available that didn't thematically fit with the game qualifies as an evil moneymaking scheme, considering the amount of content there is in GTA IV in the first place. However, as I've said, I'm not sure some of the more absurd stuff (like tanks) would fit into Liberty City as seamlessly as you seem to think, N'Gai. The city itself has been constructed as a more serious place, from the colour scheme to the car physics to the architecture. The DLC that does get released should thematically fit within that world, otherwise we'd just get a hodgepodge of artistic visions. And no one wants that.

The best place for rampaging is, indeed, the multiplayer content. Rockstar should just go mad with sandbox content in the MP arena, but keep their artistic vision intact for the singleplayer experience.

re: MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

Etchasketchist — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 19:56:11 GMT

You forgot one important item for your bullet list of possible DLC addons: stand up comedy acts. I assumed that Katt Williams and Ricky Gervais' routines were just the tip of the iceberg.

re: MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

tripl_b — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:10:47 GMT

You guys have too much time on your hands. Delving into Niko's (and other other character's psyche) is crazy - he's a video game character not a human being!! The game isn't the 10 that every single gaming mag said it was, but it is a fun game with great graphics and story.

I, for one, am having a blast playing it. Has anyone ever told you guys that you think too much?

re: MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

DeuceMojo — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:36:52 GMT

Don't get me wrong -- the new-and-improved Liberty City is the coolest environment ever, but boy is it _dead_. Empty hulks of buildings and zombies wandering the streets. Where are the gang bangers, casinos, jetpacks, planes I can fly to airports, mountains to climb with my dirtbike, and dammit, where's my parachute? Where's the sense of humor gone? Only a healthy sense of humor could explain an Evil Kinevel jump in the middle of nowhere or running a remote control enthusiast shop with David Cross. Speaking of shops -- why remove the ability to set up a business, buy a house, conquer rival territory?

I understand the desire to relegate extreme open-endedness and exploring to the multiplayer arena, but GTA IV didn't exactly shine in that arena either. Besides which, GTA's cultural legacy is open-ended, not terribly realistic, chaos instigated by one man.

I don't want 15 other players in my sandbox. I just want to be Carl, whoever he is. Because Carl is whoever is holding the controller. And may Carl continue to reign as King of Grand Theft Auto. And those that schemed to betray the anarchist, King of the World vibe of GTAs past, may their heads preach from poles (figuratively; not in a GTA IV-like realistic sense).

If a $15 DLC package added everything that's missing from this game (like most of the San Andreas-era passtimes that are mysteriously omitted from this iteration), I would probably buy it. But my money's safe; that'll never happen.

re: MTV News' Stephen Totilo Vs. Level Up's N'Gai Croal on Grand Theft Auto IV. Round 1--Fight!

PhilVillarreal — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:33:59 GMT

tripl_b, would you tell Einstein or Walt Disney that they thought too much? These guys are geniuses, let them roll.