Are The Critics Serious??
There isn't any real development of your character along the way, other than getting new clothes and new apartments which are of no benefit in the game at all. You just collect money for doing missions, but you hardly need to spend any money in the game anyway. The only thing I regularly spend money on is body armour and ammo, which is dirt cheap.
The missions in the game are fun for a little while, but they all become similar pretty quick.....drive to dot and kill a bunch of guys. Don't manage to kill bunch of guys, start from the beginning. Why oh why are there no checkpoints in this game....there's nothing worse than screwing up a mission, but to then have to drive for five minutes just to get back to the start of it is infuriating.
The game does feature a new combat system which is supposed to be the bees knees, but can't compare with the cover system in Vegas or Gears of War. The target lock in this rarely targets the enemy you want to kill. It's more likely to lock onto someone in complete cover than the guy whose standing in the open, or better yet a hot dog vendor or pedestrian. It's cumbersome and will often have you facing the wrong direction. Maybe I've just gotten used to playing shooters....or real "perfect" games like COD4.
The most fun I've had in this game is just driving around and blowing stuff up and then getting chased by some cops for a while. As you can imagine that doesn't hold a persons attention for very long.
I find it odd that gamespot gave this a perfect score and not one to World of Warcraft or Call of Duty 4 which are far and away superior products. If you didn't like the previous titles, don't expect a revelation with this release.