Developer: Rockstar North
Publisher: Rockstar Games
Genre: Action
Release Date: 04/29/2008
Console: Xbox 360
So by now you should know that I’m a fan of video games. I’m particularly a fan of video games that utilize a sandbox approach towards the game development. Oblivion, one of my favorite games, emphasizes sandbox play perfectly — there’s more storyline outside the main storyline in that one game than any ten games combined released before it.
And that’s the way I like it.
Apparently, that’s the way most of the gaming public likes it. Apparently, in the first weekend of its release, it sold roughly 6,000,000 copies, for a total of over $500,000,000 USD. That’s a lot of cash, and this game is, quite frankly, worth it.
You play the part of Nico Bellic, a Russian immigrant who came to America following the dreams of his cousin, Roman, who filled his head with stories of the luxurious life available to anyone with the chutzpah to take a chance or two. Of course, that’s not the situation Nico finds himself in, and there begins the sandbox. You can either go do the missions for your brother, picking up cab fares and building up a financial windfall… or not.
If you’ve played a GTA game before, you know that it’s pretty much totally open-ended. Go steal a car and go for a joy ride for a few hours. Or go out to the beach and beat up civilians for hours and hours and hours, slowly picking up the cash they leave behind… or don’t. You can follow the storyline or not. You can do vicious crimes or not. It’s that open-ended.
And the graphics… The first lightning storm you watch, you’ll know that this is one of the newest games on the market, using some of the best graphics ever realized. It’s just fantastic.
It has a huge drawback, however: It’s not a first-person shooter. And while that’s obvious, the reason it’s a drawback is not because I prefer FPS games, but because this game THINKS it is one sometimes. When you have to clear out a warehouse of Italian mobsters, 20 or 30 targets at a time, or when you have to clear out street after street of armed police officers after you’ve knocked over a bank–these are times when a modern FPS interface would make it a playable game.
As it is, it’s a hurdle that is nearly insurmountable. It’s painful. It’s stressful. It’s downright rude to have to go through it this way. But you have no choice, and the tiny aiming reticule you see, as though you’re merely watching over Nico’s shoulder, is all you’ve got.
So far, in the main storyline, only once has this been a required activity to go through, and there was sufficient cover and I was prepared enough to be able to get through it. The rest of the FPS-type games seem to be in the side-quests. But that’s no excuse, Rockstar. You seem to have put together a game that is unfinished in this regard. A glaring mistake.
Or a design choice? We’ve been feeding on the frenzy surrounding this game’s release for a long time now, and I was hoping that the clumsiness of previous releases would’ve been completely remedied by now.
Well…
All in all, a fantastic game. The voice acting is much above par, the graphics are awesome, and the story is interesting (if not particularly new). The interface, as mentioned, is the same old interface, tired and true. And that’s why it doesn’t get the 10/10 score that everyone else seems to give it. You give me a clunky interface, I enjoy the game much less. The interface should be as transparent as possible, and this one is very transparent–it’s totally invisible. Completely absent.