The moody atmosphere from GTA III returns but with a fantastic physics engine that makes everything feel visceral and weighty. Unfortunately these are some of the most repetitive and monotonous missions I've played in a sanbox game and I was sick of it by the halfway point.
The story is average though the solid voice acting and cutscene direction helped to keep me engaged most of the time, especially before all the mob stuff takes center stage and it just becomes an average gangster movie.
The effects are all excellent and made the shooting feel satisfying enough but mouse + keyboard makes this game a joke. With checkpoints like these though I would rather just make the game easy instead of plugging in a controller and having to retry driving sections over and over.
The driving is quite satisfying to pull off well but by the end you wish that Niko would rush just a little bit faster to get things done when you fly off a motorcycle and your mission target is rapidly escaping.
Some aspects of the humour have aged EXTREMELY poorly even knowing what I was in for and expecting a bit of dated stuff here and there. Domestic violence especially seems to get ribbed on a weirdly high amount. The way they handle Gracie as well is just downright awful and mean-spirited, playing off some atrocious stuff for laughs because she fits the stereotypical 'dumb blonde' and the main characters get annoyed by her, lightening the horror of what they're doing to her, apparently?
I played a LOT of this as a teenager and going back to complete it helped me to appreciate how much effort went into the city, the engine, and the mood. They really wanted to take themselves more seriously and it sometimes pays off but then the classic GTA gameplay gets in the way and massively overstays it's welcome. Maybe wanting to commit to the realism made them scale back on the mission variety a whole lot.
Really fun multiplayer for what it's worth, even if most of my sessions involved just going into the walkable buildings and staging a siege against infinite waves of police.
The story is average though the solid voice acting and cutscene direction helped to keep me engaged most of the time, especially before all the mob stuff takes center stage and it just becomes an average gangster movie.
The effects are all excellent and made the shooting feel satisfying enough but mouse + keyboard makes this game a joke. With checkpoints like these though I would rather just make the game easy instead of plugging in a controller and having to retry driving sections over and over.
The driving is quite satisfying to pull off well but by the end you wish that Niko would rush just a little bit faster to get things done when you fly off a motorcycle and your mission target is rapidly escaping.
Some aspects of the humour have aged EXTREMELY poorly even knowing what I was in for and expecting a bit of dated stuff here and there. Domestic violence especially seems to get ribbed on a weirdly high amount. The way they handle Gracie as well is just downright awful and mean-spirited, playing off some atrocious stuff for laughs because she fits the stereotypical 'dumb blonde' and the main characters get annoyed by her, lightening the horror of what they're doing to her, apparently?
I played a LOT of this as a teenager and going back to complete it helped me to appreciate how much effort went into the city, the engine, and the mood. They really wanted to take themselves more seriously and it sometimes pays off but then the classic GTA gameplay gets in the way and massively overstays it's welcome. Maybe wanting to commit to the realism made them scale back on the mission variety a whole lot.
Really fun multiplayer for what it's worth, even if most of my sessions involved just going into the walkable buildings and staging a siege against infinite waves of police.