This review contains spoilers
A bag of diamonds, and the seedy underground of one Liberty City.
And thus ends the GTA IV "trilogy" (though it's more a game and a half), but that's besides the point. If you like Rockstar for their attention to detail and eccentric and entertaining characters, it's all here baby, the whole package. And if you weren't a fan of IV and TLAD's gritty tone, this might strike your fancy. The city is still as grey and dull as it was then, but Rockstar manages to color in between the lines a little here and there. That traditional GTA feeling isn't back in full swing, but this is as close as it gets when it comes to GTA IV.
This is certainly the better of the two DLCs. The characters are more interesting, missions are more fun, and I don't have to drive those fuck ass bikes. There is so much more life in this DLC compared to TLAD in every aspect it is almost embarrassing. Though I must admit I am not a great big fan of Luis. I don't care about his mom, I don't care about his booty calls, and I don't care about his friends. I suppose he is meant to serve as a change of pace from the usual gun-ho protagonists, but even in this aspect he does not succeed. As long as you ask him more than once he'll kill someone for you. Not all that interesting. I also suppose we are supposed to care about Tony as well. He is amusing I will admit, but that is about it. Luis saves his ass time and again and does essentially everything for him. I was getting flashbacks from Liberty City Stories with the amount I was just getting bitched and running errands.
Even if TBOGT picks up some of the pieces the base game left behind, it could not escape the pitfalls of its gameplay. Things were most certainly worse in TLAD, but this still isn't exactly a joy to play. Shooting feels janky and inaccurate, driving is a glorified ice-skating minigame with a serious lack of control, and even something so simple as running feels more like operating puppet strings than it does controlling a person. Rockstars pursuit of a physics based gameplay system was a tremendous detriment to this game.
TBOGTs hyper sexual essence captures late 2000s American culture and early internet absurdities in sufficient color, but this elevated level of expression isolates this second DLC from the first as well as the base game, the glaring issues of which remain unavoidable.
Kanye on the soundtrack doe thas wassup.
And thus ends the GTA IV "trilogy" (though it's more a game and a half), but that's besides the point. If you like Rockstar for their attention to detail and eccentric and entertaining characters, it's all here baby, the whole package. And if you weren't a fan of IV and TLAD's gritty tone, this might strike your fancy. The city is still as grey and dull as it was then, but Rockstar manages to color in between the lines a little here and there. That traditional GTA feeling isn't back in full swing, but this is as close as it gets when it comes to GTA IV.
This is certainly the better of the two DLCs. The characters are more interesting, missions are more fun, and I don't have to drive those fuck ass bikes. There is so much more life in this DLC compared to TLAD in every aspect it is almost embarrassing. Though I must admit I am not a great big fan of Luis. I don't care about his mom, I don't care about his booty calls, and I don't care about his friends. I suppose he is meant to serve as a change of pace from the usual gun-ho protagonists, but even in this aspect he does not succeed. As long as you ask him more than once he'll kill someone for you. Not all that interesting. I also suppose we are supposed to care about Tony as well. He is amusing I will admit, but that is about it. Luis saves his ass time and again and does essentially everything for him. I was getting flashbacks from Liberty City Stories with the amount I was just getting bitched and running errands.
Even if TBOGT picks up some of the pieces the base game left behind, it could not escape the pitfalls of its gameplay. Things were most certainly worse in TLAD, but this still isn't exactly a joy to play. Shooting feels janky and inaccurate, driving is a glorified ice-skating minigame with a serious lack of control, and even something so simple as running feels more like operating puppet strings than it does controlling a person. Rockstars pursuit of a physics based gameplay system was a tremendous detriment to this game.
TBOGTs hyper sexual essence captures late 2000s American culture and early internet absurdities in sufficient color, but this elevated level of expression isolates this second DLC from the first as well as the base game, the glaring issues of which remain unavoidable.
Kanye on the soundtrack doe thas wassup.