Grand Theft Auto IV - Micro Review

There’s plenty of GTA IV reviews out there,some with spoilers (!) and some without - obviously the latter are preferable. Therefore this is not an in-depth review, just how I came to own it and my experience so far.

I forewent the traditional pre-order for reasons I can’t remember (or fathom) until about three weeks ago. By then all ’standard’ editions were sold out except for Tesco, but they couldn’t guarantee delivery on release day which the fundamental point of pre-ordering. There were lots of ’special’ editions available, but for me the goodies didn’t justify the expense. As launch day approached and the hype machine went into overdrive I started to regret my decision to not order. Yesterday I decided I would make the pilgrimage to our friendly neighbourhood 24-hour ASDA (only ~15 miles away). I got there around 11:10 and there were already 20-odd people queuing. A few minutes later there were another 10 behind me. They were ‘good’ and made us wait until midnight (to add insult to injury the wall clock was fast, and they had to wait for the tills to say it was time) but shortly before they divided us into two lines for PS3 and Xbox 360, which put me around number five in the queue. I got to the front, paid (£34!), and walked away.

The game itself should probably been called “Grand Theft Auto Distilled”. It’s everything we love about about GTA, just concentrated. The level of detail is amazing. The changes to the gameplay work really well. It’s just great fun. However this definitely deserves the 18 rating. It’s no worse than most films these days, but for a game it is pretty graphic. For those old enough to play it, it is a must have.

I’ve not yet tried the multiplayer, but I will be soon. If you fancy a game, I’m sure you can work out my Xbox Live gamertag.