A flawless gem with plenty of wit and perfect mechanics and hopefully where the gaming community is heading.
You are Niko Bellic an ex-soldier turned gun for hire you are the deffinition of old school killer one that questions what he does yet still does it. The main character is probably the best in any game I have ever played hell he is probably the best I have seen period.
The shooting is solid not one problem you aim you shoot your bullet goes where you aim it and as you continue to shoot your aim gets crappy. The game has an auto aim feature which I hated so very much. It locks onto whoever is closest to you this is great unless you have a perfect shot at the guy you are supposed to kill and it locks onto some lackey playing with himself. Yet at the same time some areas are so dark you need it because all you can see is muzzle flashes thats pretty much my only annoyance with this game.
The driving is really strange at first. I never played a game where the cars handle like they do. At the start every single turn I took I ended up hitting the other side of the street. It took me the better part of three hours to really get the hang of it and once I did I loved it you can pull off all sorts to crazy stuff. You can also in this one shoot at a 360 degree angle is very helpful!
The world is huge, fun, and there is ALWAYS something going on. They made Liberty city live and breath. Like in the san andreas you get a cellphone although unlick in SA you get to use your cellphone nifty eh? yea i didnt think so either until you learn you can do stuff with your friends such as play darts, or get drunk (this is endless amounts of fun absolutely histarical) or even a comedy club and see Katt Williams and some other guy who i cant remember his name, that i really didnt like much and more or less made fat jokes. This is all pointless I know but if you hang out with your friends they will do stuff for you like sell you discounted weapons or will send a cab and give you a free ride anywhere you want to go. You can also hail cabs but they cost moolah but you get so much of it who cares.
This brings me to one thing that really dissapointed me about this game. Unlike the last GTA's you really dont gain anything you dont become big you dont get a mansion at the end all you are is out of debt. Which brings me to the fact this game is a huge political message. I loved it although on the outside it is more or less childish stereotypical jokes if you really start to delve into it the entire game is a huge satire on how amazingly lost and more or less how blind and dumb we are.
To continue on that the game features the radio (as always) and a new addition the internet. The internet in this game is hilarious and massive I think I read every page but who knows. It has everything from my mexican doctor to a dating site and you can date girls from the internet. They work the same as friends but more annoying although they are also more helpful because they have careers and if one is a lawyer she can make them nasty porkers stop hatin. There is also news there is your extremely right news which is potrayed as Weazel news and is the mainstream information. Then you have the local news which is more or less how it is. And finally you have your completely useless news about all them rich people. To tack this on the music on the radio was okay I really enjoyed the Reggae station and the russian station but the others more or less sounded the same. The talk radios are hilarious although a little on the short side.
Weaponary and dress-up. To start with the latter not to many clothes shops not to many items but I didnt care I got a black suit white shirt red tie and I was happy. Weaponary not a whole lot you get the, basic pistol, smg, shotty rifle machine gun, RPG. Each one of these accept the RPG have an upgraded version which is more or less put a combat infront of all those weapons.
Vehicles there are TONS of them from your basic 4-door to a unstoppable patriot to an infernus. There are there plus more. You also got the bikes these were a bit of a pain if you knick anything slightly you have a VERY good chance of flying off your bike fase first into incoming traffic and have an old guy stop on top of your body so you die although if you sit on the bike a few seconds before driving Niko will put on a helmet although I dont think it helps you one bit. Second I dont know if it was just me but there were a few to many bike chases. The vehicles are fun if your driving a really old rusty car your engine will sputter and sparks will shoot out of your exhaust. If you are driving a high end sports car and you pound the gas your car will shoot out flames here and again.
Graphics are really great. Weapons have a neat muzzle flash, the bullets are like tiny fireballs hurling into you. The cars look amazing explosions are cool its like the movies but a lot better. Game also has a neat little slow motion effect if you are in cinema mode which doubles as a helpful way to navigate traffic.
Missions are pretty much the same as always go there kill them chase that. There are neat little bits where you have choices on whether or not to kill somone or a choice on who to kill. These have a effects later if you dont kill somone the person who hired you might find out and be really unhappy or it has no effect at all. There are also friends these arent the same as your friends but just random people on the street you can talk to and then help. If you fail any mission (accept the friends) you get a little message on your phone asking you if you want to redo it. This will then pop you right back to where you got the mission and you will be on your way.
The detail is AMAZING it is absolutely amazing. To explain this lets have a little in the day of. You walk out of your apartment pop out the biggest rifle you own and everyone runs away screaming and two cop cars show up with reports of a man with a gun. So you quickly run to the closest car and point the gun at the driver. Instead of how they usually would just honk the horn at you they put up their hands and get out of the car or more likely they just duck. Unluckly for niko they did the latter so he pops em in the face. No longer does the body convienantly fall out his head flops onto the horn and his foot floors the gas and you have a car running you over. By now the cops are right next to you so as you get up they point their guns at you and Niko will then surrender and happily go to jail or you can bust away and run lets do the latter. So we pop up and run to a car because after the shooting everyone gets out of their cars and runs. So you jump into your car and are breaking the window of the car to stick your arm out and shoot. While shooting you go driving off full speed and are paying more attention to shooting then driving and run into a wall you then fly through the windshield and head first into concrete. You wake up at a hospital much poorer.
Cant end this without mentioning the multiplayer. Yep you have the entire city and you can have your friends run around the city with you. There are guns all over the place and you can then either drive around with em or kill eachother. Other then free roam there are tons of different game types and they are a lot of fun. They range from deathmatch to team deathmatch to all sorts of random games one being crooks and cops where the crooks have to protect their boss until he can escape on the chopper while the cops have to kill the boss. This is endless fun and there is a gametype that everyone will enjoy.
This game i reluctantly give a 10 to. I hate saying something is perfect but in the spirit of next gen this game has raised the bar tenfold. I doubt I will see a game anywhere near this good for a while.
-Peace