A lot of players are filling up GTA IV servers but very few appear to know what the hell they're doing, something this guide will attempt to rectify. Using these tactics and understanding how to play well with others will find you making more money in ranked matches, as well as racking up kills and dominating the game with your uncanny abilities.
This guide is focused on general strategies that can be used on most of the available game types. I'll be posting a game-mode specific guide in the coming days, followed by a helpful hosting guide that should make multiplayer games more enjoyable for all involved.
Uwe Boll, considered the worst-living-director in the universe (and possibly alternate realities) is making it known that he'd be the perfect director for a Grand Theft Auto movie.
“Grand Theft Auto would be super interesting for me, and I think I would actually be the right guy to do it, because my movies are all bloody and violent and I don't have a problem with action scenes,” said the director. “But they will go in the end with a Michael Bay or a Brett Ratner and it will be a PG-13 movie made for $150 million. I think it would be better to make a $30 million, very hard, brutal movie without compromising, but I'm not optimistic.”
I'm sure the execs at Take 2 are scrambling to secure his talents as I write this.
With game reviewers still mopping up their collective ejaculate, you'd think GTA IV was the greatest game of all time. The amount of hyperbole showered on Rockstar's game was unparalleled, with nearly every critic unleashing a string of adjectives that cast GTA IV as the second coming of video gaming Christ. Once the initial euphoria of the graphics wears off, you soon realize that GTA IV doesn't evolve its inherent gameplay beyond that which has come before, and in a lot of respects, significantly less.
With a Metacritic score of 99%, one might think it impossible to find any faults with a game that has been equated with everything from Citizen Kane to The Godfather. Wrong.
Commence flame-war! 8Bit Joystick has posted a feature titled 12 Reasons Why Grand Theft Auto IV is Better on Xbox 360 than PS3, something sure to get loyal PS3 owners all worked up.
Some of the reasons include a higher native resolution, more available RAM, faster disc access and multiplayer that actually works.
If nothing else, Grand Theft Auto IV is a great media gateway for organizations to get free television time to spout their respective outrage towards the contents of the game. We've already had Mothers Against Drunk Driving issue a statement and some immigrant organization is bent out of shape, but I've come up with a list of 10 groups that have been suspiciously silent.
1. DMV
The Department of Motor Vehicles should condemn GTA IV for its horrible portrayal of licensed drivers. Apparently, the Liberty City branch of the DMV will give a license to anyone, evidenced by the total lack of Student Driver vehicles on city streets. In Liberty City, if you can afford the fee, you get a license. Simple as that.
Spammers are quickly shifting gears, ditching previous promises of a free Xbox, PS3, iPod, iPhone as a marketing lure in exchange for GTA IV.
Spam-blocking firm ClearMyMail reported that more than half of the junk mail being blocked by its service this week is Grand Theft Auto IV related.
The vast majority offer the opportunity to 'win' a PlayStation 3 complete with the game on opening the email, and others invite the victim to pornographic websites which link to viruses.
Dan Field, managing director of ClearMyMail, said: "We are seeing unprecedented levels of spam in relation to the game.
"More than half of the spam our service is blocking is related to Grand Theft Auto, most of which contain viruses and spyware.
"Spammers are like conmen: they are the ultimate opportunists and like nothing more than to prey on the susceptible.
"My advice to anybody who receives these emails is to refrain from opening it, and to wait until they can legitimately purchase the game, even if disappointed by the record sales of this morning."
Adam Kuban of Serious Eats has put together a visual guide that showcases real-life restaurants in New York that were the likely inspiration for several locations in Grand Theft Auto 4.
If you're one of the millions of gamers who will be picking up Grand Theft Auto IV this week, don't forget to sign up for Rockstar's Social Club. There you can link your Xbox Live Gamertag or Playstation Network ID to your Rockstar account and track a myriad of stats. There are also special competitions sponsored by Rockstar that act something like dynamic Xbox Live achievements. The first large competition is for entry into what has been dubbed The 100% Club. Qualifying Social Club members that attain 100% completion within 7 days of the release of GTA4 (that's today) will receive a limited edition "key to the city".
Even if you have no intention of playing a marathon session of Grand Theft Auto IV for The 100% Club, the Social Club is a fun diversion and just another way to prove your gaming superiority to your friends, besides GTA4's built-in multiplayer modes. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to get back to Liberty City.
One final note: If you're looking for some more players to tool around Liberty City with, be sure to click my profile link and add myself and any other InfoAddict members you come across. Profiles can hold a Gamertag, PSN ID, Wii system number, and Steam ID, so if you haven't done that yet, what are you waiting for?!
It's GTA IV launch day, which means if you're reading this then either your Xbox 360 red-ringed, your local Gamestop is out-of-stock, or UPS hasn't arrived at your door yet. It's also a day for organizations to get their 15-minutes of media exposure, condemning GTA IV for all of the perceived evils it represents.
C|Net has a good roundup of the haters, most of which are attacking without having played the game. The name alone is enough to incur their wrath.
None of this, of course, matters to critics like Yee or the Parents Television Council, both of which cited the oft-reported history of violence in GTA as reason behind their statements.
"We've seen a number of clips of the game," said Yee spokesperson Adam Keigwin. "From the clips alone, and based on GTA and Rockstar's history, (Yee) thought it very appropriate to issue a statement urging parents not to purchase the game for their children."
Similarly, Gavin McKiernan, the national grassroots director for the Parents Television Council, said that despite not having seen the game yet, "You can't necessarily wait until the cat's out of the bag...There's a huge (GTA) marketing and release push, and I'm sure this game will sell lots and lots of copies, so you can't wait."
Last Friday, IGN posted their "exclusive" review of Grand Theft Auto 4, this year's critic-proof game. The posting of the review highlighted a bizarre practice in game media of adhering to publisher-imposed embargoes, wherein a publisher tells you a review cannot go up until a specific day. One of the many troubling aspects of this practice is that every first-tier site or magazine had access to GTA IV early so as to get their reviews prepared prior to GTA's launch. However, IGN was given special permission to run their review two days before everyone else.
You'd think that once IGN posted their review that every other wesbite would soon follow suit, no longer shackled by the demands of Take 2, GTA's publisher. That didn't happen. Sites still played the Embargo Game and stuck to their allocated dates for fear of reprisal.
I will have an article ready to go this week that explores this matter in more detail. As someone who has been working in this industry for 15 years as a writer, I've seen a lot of nonsense that I'll be sharing. In the meantime, Ben Fritz of Variety is tackling the issue of IGN and GTA 4. Worth a read.
Perhaps I was wrong about one thing. Even though IGN ran its review yesterday, nobody else seems to have one up. Not even IGN's biggest competitors GameSpot and 1UP. Apparently they're all waiting on an embargo that Kotaku says is tomorrow (Sunday) morning. That truly blows my mind. In my world, if I had a story or review ready to go and was waiting on an embargo, the minute somebody else ran the same review or story, I would run mine. If a publisher or studio or whatever gave me a later embargo, tough sh*t.
It seems inevitable that high profile video games will get leaked. It's happened with every AAA console title in the last few years, and Grand Theft Auto IV is no exception. Whether obtained through a shady retailer or downloaded from the web (sadly GTA4 has already found its way onto pirate networks) gamers across the globe are getting their hands on one of the biggest releases of the year a week early. For those that won't stoop to less-than-legal levels to play the game or aren't willing to fellate a GameStop manager, the next few days will be a painful wait.
To help pass the time though, some lucky souls that do have Grand Theft Auto IV are giving the rest of us the next best thing: tons of video footage of the game. Rockstar Games have been quick to shut down clips that they find on YouTube and other large video outlets, but so far DailyMotion hasn't pulled anything. One nice fellow over at NeoGAF has been kind enough to keep an updated post of links to GTA4 vids, most of them coming from DailyMotion. Keep in mind that there may be spoilers in these videos, so if you want a clean slate when you pick up GTA4 you'd best steer clear.
Hit the jump for a ton more videos, and of course be prepared to play GTA4 on April 29!
The fourth and final trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV has arrived, and like the other media we've seen so far, it looks spectacular. Appropriately titled 'Good Lord, What Are You Doing?' the trailer primarily shows off more of the game's cutscenes, but there's gameplay footage to see as well. There really isn't much more to say at this point other than, "I want this game right now."
Trailer 4: Good Lord, What Are You Doing?
GTA4 arrives on April 29 for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. Hit the next page if you missed out on the three previous trailers.
