PC: 3/12/2008
PlayStation 3: 29/04/2008
Xbox 360: 29/04/2008
Grand Theft Auto IV is a 2008 open world action-adventure video game developed by Rockstar North.
It is the eleventh title in the Grand Theft Auto series, and the first main entry since Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas in 2004. As the first title in the series to be released for the seventh generation of video game consoles, Grand Theft Auto IV was highly anticipated preceding its release.
What do Rockstar games tell us about American history?
There is a familiar pattern to media coverage whenever Rockstar publishes a game. There is talk about how the developer has used its newest game to iterate upon and redefine the open world genre. There are almost always articles on how various Hollywood films influenced Rockstar's development process. And there are at least one or two polemics that attack the developer for transgressing established norms about what can and cannot be done in video games. This last type of essay inevitably concludes that video games are bad, and lead to an increase in interpersonal violence as well as the downfall of civilisation.
UPDATE: Rockstar says it still supports single-player mods, is working on a solution.
UPDATE 15/06/2017 1.22am: Grand Theft Auto developer Rockstar Games has responded to OpenIV's removal, claiming that the software could interfere with the game's online modes and that it's working on a solution that will enable fans to still make single-player mods.
UPDATED: The Lost and the Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony also tested via backward compatibility.
UPDATE 14/2/17 4:20pm: The results are in for GTA4's Episodes from Liberty City, tested via Xbox One backward compatibility - and perhaps not surprisingly, we're seeing the same kind of performance profile we saw on the main game.
Charting the phenomenal progress of video games these past few decades is easy enough. You've probably seen an image of PlayStation-era Lara Croft in all her stark polygonal beauty contrasted side-by-side with her modern character model. If not, perhaps you've seen Wolfenstein: The New Order's B.J. Blazkowicz sat next to his coarsely drawn early incarnation. Look at all those pixels, all that detail, and marvel at how far we've come.
Nintendo shocked us all when it revealed its plan to bring Mario to the real world - or a close approximation of it anyway - with its upcoming Switch adventure Super Mario Odyssey. Given that it's set in a slightly Nintendo-ised version of New York, Grand Theft Auto 4 fan CrowbCat has re-imagined this family affair as a gritty tale of Mario's brushes with the law, gravity, booze, and automobile theft.
Indeed this version of Super Mario Odyssey lacks the Easter egg hunt appeal of Nintendo's New Donk City, and this taller rendition of Mario looks less charming than his portly pint-sized counterpart, but that only makes them feel more at home in the Big Apple, where folks in giant plush knock-off mascot costumes aren't a particularly unusual sight.
Still, it's less terrifying than the live-action Super Mario Bros. movie, amirite?
UPDATE 13th April 2016: Rockstar has dismissed allegations made in a lawsuit from former Rockstar North chief Leslie Benzies, calling the claims "downright bizarre".
In BBC drama helmed by Black Mirror and Misfits director.
Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe is in negotiations to star in the BBC's upcoming drama Grand Theft Auto, a feature-length programme about the popular game series' creation.
Last year it was Gabe Newell, and before him Peter Molyneux, Will Wright and Shigeru Miyamoto. The BAFTA Fellowship is, according to BAFTA, "the highest accolade bestowed".
How the Rockstar classic shaped the way that we look at games.
We're just three days away from the release of Grand Theft Auto 5 - closer to two if you're planning to attend a midnight launch for the year's most eagerly awaited game. At Digital Foundry, we're aiming to bring you our findings on both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game as soon as we can, but in the meantime we thought we'd take the time to pay tribute to its predecessor, not least because so much of what we do and the way we approach games today hails from the seismic release of GTA4 five years ago, and that Face-Off we produced at the time.
I'm back in Liberty City again. It doesn't feel like five years since Grand Theft Auto 4, but while other games have been traded in or loaned out, that disc has remained beneath the TV, a passport waiting to be used.
Rockstar's upcoming Grand Theft Auto 5 will shake the studio's best-selling open-world template up a great deal by introducing the option to switch between three characters on the fly while the two unpossessed members will continue going about their business. Now, some clever modders have created a way to implement this into Grand Theft Auto 4.
Who needs Grand Theft Auto 5? Well, not the industrious folk that are porting the whole of PlayStation 2 classic Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas into Grand Theft Auto 4.
"Keep walking, asshole, before I shove this nightstick where the sun don't shine."
Rude, abrasive, unnecessary. It's all of these things, but I'd let it go, just because it's a hell of a lot of hassle to do anything about it.
But I do a double take. This is a policeman. A PoliceMAN. I'm Johnny Motherf***ing Klebitz. I'm part of The Lost and the Damned, whose entire purpose is to F*** the MAN. I'm not going to let this slide.
From the archive: Why GTA4's Roman Bellic is one of the greatest video game characters of all time.
Every Sunday we bring you a feature selected from our archive. This week, to celebrate the imminent release of Grand Theft Auto 5 on PS4 and Xbox One, we bring you Dan Whitehead's paean to an unloved GTA4 character. This article was originally published in November 2011.
Exclusive games and downloadable content are "critical" for the Xbox 360, Microsoft has said.
Exclusive content - even if it's only for a set period of time - is crucial for differentiating the Xbox 360 from the PlayStation 3 and Wii, Microsoft's European boss Chris Lewis told Eurogamer.
"They are important," he said. "DLC windows of exclusivity are critical for us for differentiation. We'll continue to bring those exclusives through our own studio work, Gears and Forza and other titles."
The link between violent video games such as Grand Theft Auto and the riots that have gripped the UK this week are entirely predictable and part of a cycle of moral panic, according to experts.
Behold! Here's your essential weekly guide to spending slightly less on games than you might pay otherwise. Cheap This Week is a collection of the best deals from across the land every Wednesday; read on to find out which gaming deals we think are worth your attention this week. If you want updates about which games are cheap pumped into your web browser every second, be sure to head to SavyGamer.co.uk.
A private Take-Two casting call is advertising for an actor to portray James Pedeaston - a character from Grand Theft Auto IV and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
Take-Two's sales figures suggest there's never been a better time to be a core gamer.
Published as part of our sister-site GamesIndustry.biz's widely-read weekly newsletter, the GamesIndustry.biz Editorial, is a weekly dissection of an issue weighing on the minds of the people at the top of the games business. It appears on Eurogamer after it goes out to GI.biz newsletter subscribers.
Imagine typing the name of a game wrong on your CV! That's what renowned stuntman Declan Mulvey claimed happened when he seemed to inadvertently leak the existence of Grand Theft Auto V.
Just a few weeks after the game's release, Take-Two has announced that more than 5 million copies of Rockstar's Red Dead Redemption have now been shipped.
Rockstar has told Eurogamer it cannot comment on how long the Grand Theft Auto IV downloadable content was exclusive to Xbox 360, although in hindsight it appears to have been a 12-month deal.
Just under 14 months elapsed between The Lost and Damned appearing on Xbox Live and its eventual appearance on PS3 this month, suggesting the deal may have been measured from the release of the first add-on (the second, The Ballad of Gay Tony, arrived relatively recently on Xbox 360 and is already available for PS3).
Microsoft also wouldn't verify the length of the exclusivity deal to Eurogamer. The platform holder reportedly paid millions and millions of dollars to secure it in 2006. Sony pointed us back to Rockstar and Microsoft.
Parents must take responsibility for keeping violent content away from children - that was the message this morning from Mothers Against Violence in a BBC Radio Leeds debate on violent videogames.
Games industry analyst Mike Hickey has said a Grand Theft Auto V announcement may be on the way - and that it could be made before E3 kicks off in June.
"There is building suspension for a pre-E3 GTA V announcement," he said, as reported by Industrygamers. "Although we expect nothing from Rockstar at this year’s official E3 event."
Rockstar is more likely to hold a separate press event and make the announcement independent of any publisher conferences, apparently. That's because GTA V really is kind of a big deal.
Take Two has announced that Rockstar Games' Red Dead Redemption is now due for release on 18th May in the US and 21st May elsewhere - three weeks later than originally planned.
The publisher issued its Q1 financial results this evening and also noted that Grand Theft Auto IV has now sold over 15 million units worldwide, while BioShock 2 has shipped three million units.
Elsewhere there was confirmation that LA Noire, Mafia II, Max Payne 3 and Sid Meier's Civilization V are all due out in the company's fourth fiscal quarter - which ends 31st October 2010 - but the publisher noted that its guidance "reflects the potential movement of one of these titles into fiscal 2011".
Rockstar boss Dan Houser has once more poured cold water on the idea of Grand Theft Auto being adapted to film in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.
You won't find too many exec interviews on Eurogamer - we usually leave that sort of thing to our friends over at GamesIndustry.biz. But we got the opportunity to speak to Ben Feder, CEO of Take-Two, at E3 this year. Seeing as he's a big deal, and his company publishes one of the most successful videogame franchises ever, we thought we'd give it a go. Read on to find out Feder's opinion of Jack Thompson, whether he thinks there's a line to be drawn with violence in games and what day GTA V is out. Maybe not the last one.
Microsoft plans to let Xbox Live Silver members play Grand Theft Auto IV online modes free for five days. This kind of treatment is usually reserved for Gold subscribers.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is heading up the nominations for the British Academy Video Game Awards this year, which take place in London on 10th March.
Rockstar bigwig and Grand Theft Auto lead writer Dan Houser reckons that videogames are still storytelling infants and doesn't want the industry to grow up any time soon.
Rockstar has released a second patch for Grand Theft Auto IV, which is 32MB and can be downloaded from the publisher's website.
According to Rockstar, the patch adds new graphics sliders for water and shadow quality, and reflection resolution, along with "definition" and "vsync" toggles, so you can further tailor the game's visuals to fit your hardware.
However, there's a problem with some controllers, apparently. "As a result of the patch we had to disable the default setting for direct input device support," Rockstar explained. "To reactivate your supported gamepad simply enter the command line, '-usedirectinput'."
Take-Two has announced "a new incentive compensation programme" based on profit sharing for the Rockstar Games label, and "long-term employment agreements" for key team-members including Sam and Dan Houser and GTA producer Leslie Benzies.
Rockstar has patched Grand Theft Auto IV for PC to deal with "known issues including, but not limited to, performance, input functionality, and overall stability".
Despite strong reviews (including our own), the game has been rocked by stability issues and error messages, with some players unable to get the game working at all.
Our office copy, for example, simply didn't work, throwing up a fatal error message - one of many encountered by players.
Rockstar is hosting a special Social Club event this weekend where fans can challenge staff at Midnight Club: Los Angeles and Grand Theft Auto IV multiplayer as well as win lots of prizes.
Call of Duty: World at War has notched up a fourth week in command of the UK All-Formats Chart. With just two weeks to go, looks like it's a strong contender to take the Christmas top spot.
Grand Theft Auto IV publisher Rockstar has confirmed it is working on a patch to resolve problems with the PC version of the game.
"[We] understand that several of you are experiencing difficulties with Grand Theft Auto IV PC, and we are committed to doing everything we can to help resolve these troubles," reads a post on the GTA forums.
That includes releasing a new driver to improve performance with 7900 series Nvidia cards, and another one from ATI.
Players are reporting that Grand Theft Auto IV on PC has some major reliability problems - but Rockstar is on the way to the rescue.
"We are aware that a small number of fans are having problems running GTA IV on their PCs and we would like to assure them we are working to help solve these as quickly as possible," a Rockstar spokesperson told GTAGaming.
"We would ask anyone that is encountering difficulties to contact their local technical support helpline for advice and recommendations. These telephone numbers can be found in the game's manual.
I love Halo 3, you understand. But when it came out, and people asked me to describe it, my one-liner was, "Imagine if you had all the money in the world to spend on a game but couldn't change anything." Halo, conceptually, was as complete a thing as Mario Kart. To alter it too much, to push it in another direction, would be to destroy it. So we got flashes of user-generated content, multiplayer transparency, whatever. And, in the middle, Halo sitting there unchanged.
It's not a problem Rockstar ever has to face. The joy of GTA is that it isn't a complete thing. It's endless. If the devs had all the money in the world to spend it wouldn't be enough. There's always something else which could fit in there without changing its core values. But with GTA IV, with as much money as it's about possible for a videogame company to have, we saw what they could do. While it's a step away from certain features of San Andreas, this is as maximalist as a game's ever been, in terms of production values at least. The moment when you're replaying a mission and you realise it's got a completely different, brilliantly voiced conversation between the characters in the car is when you realise you're a long way from most games' occasional barks from whoever was passing through the studio at the time.
It's quite the thing. It's now on the PC. And it's fundamentally the same as the console versions. I'd go and read our console-version review to catch up on the basics, and return here to see how things have changed.
Grand Theft Auto IV for PC will come equipped with DRM software to protect the game from naughty pirates, Rockstar has said, but there's no limit on concurrent installations.
One final, and quite tasty, morsel of information about the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV ahead of its release next week: there's multiplayer support for up to 32 players.
Rockstar has released a video showing how you use the editing feature included in the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV, which is due out on 3rd December.
Following on from the success of the last round of shorts created with the Grand Theft Auto IV PC video editor, Rockstar has sent forth another couple of its custom creations.
With Grand Theft Auto IV due out for the PC on 3rd December in Europe (yes, it's a Wednesday), Rockstar has released four videos to show off what you can do with the video editor included with the game.
Rockstar has pushed the release of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars back to some time between February and April 2009. We had expected the DS instalment before the end of January.
For many gamers, GTA was born on the PC in 2D. We've all got our memories of racing through the time-limited demo, the squeaky phone gibberish playing over mission instructions, trying to work out the lyrics to Four-Letter Love, and doing the bomb-on-a-bus mission. But that was a while ago, back when Speed starring Keanu Reeves was a cultural touchstone. These days, GTA is synonymous with consoles, having bossed the last PlayStation for Sony and given Microsoft something to shout about for the last 18 months. Did you know they have some exclusive DLC coming up? Did you?
Grand Theft Auto IV has thundered to the top of the Japanese chart this week, selling more than double the number of copies of LittleBigPlanet - which makes its chart debut at three.
Not that Sony will mind too much, as the PS3 version of GTA IV proved the most popular with 133,000 sales - nearly 100,000 more than on Xbox 360, according to Media Create data on NeoGAF.
Both GTA IV and LittleBigPlanet also helped boost PS3 hardware sales, which rocketed up to 39,587, making the Sony machine the best selling console in Japan this week.
Rockstar has released a Trophy patch for Grand Theft Auto IV on PS3.
There are 51 of the shiny rewards to extract, and judging by the PS3Trophies.org listing, the line-up is the same as the Xbox 360 Achievements except for one, the Platinum Trophy called "Taking A Liberty".
As with the other retrospective Trophy patches for PS3 games, the GTA IV update is sadly not retroactive, so you will need to play through the game again to unlock them.
Microsoft has confirmed Grand Theft Auto IV downloadable content will be coming to Xbox 360 in time for Christmas.
There was a bit of confusion, you may recall, after Take-Two suggested it could be released as late as January 2009.
But yesterday's press release announcing the Xbox 360 price cut stated, "The first of the Xbox 360 exclusive downloadable episodes for this record-breaking game will be available this autumn - the only console with new Grand Theft Auto IV content available this Christmas."
Rockstar has released new patches for the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Grand Theft Auto IV.
According to the Rockstar Social Club website, the patches fix "multiplayer connectivity issues" such as freezes and bugs within races and lobbies. Visit the site for the full rundown.
"We sincerely apologise for any inconveniences and thank you for your continued support," said Rockstar.
Grand Theft Auto IV sold 8.5 million units between 29th April and 31st May, with shipments to retail now at 11 million, Take-Two said in its latest round of financials, which announced a USD 98.2 million Q2 net profit.
As part of its Q2 financial reports, Take-Two has admitted that episodic content for Grand Theft Auto IV on Xbox 360 has been delayed from fiscal Q4 2008 to Q1 2009, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
Sales of Xbox 360 consoles are 18 per cent ahead of the PlayStation 3 in the UK since the launch of Grand Theft Auto IV, Chart-Track told Eurogamer today.
In even better news for Microsoft, official GTA IV sales figures for the first four weeks also reveal that the Xbox 360 is the format of choice for UK gamers, with 57 per cent of the total sales of the game on 360, compared to 43 per cent on PS3.
Current Chart-Track panel figures place sales of the game in the UK at over 1.3 million, meaning around 750,000 copies have shifted on Xbox 360, and around 570,000 on PS3. To put that into context, in under four weeks Rockstar’s opus has shifted almost as many copies as last year’s best-seller, FIFA 08 - a game which launched on every format under the sun.
Grand Theft Auto IV remained at the top of the UK All Formats chart for the fourth straight week, beating off strong challenges from Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures and Haze, which debuted at two and three respectively.
Niko Bellic actor Michael Hollick has said he was "almost more ready for [critical] backlash than for anything else" in the run up to Grand Theft Auto IV release.
Michael Hollick, the voice actor who portrayed Niko Bellic in Grand Theft Auto IV, has had a pop at his union for failing to protect voice acting talent in games - or getting him more money, reports GamesIndustry.biz.
Grand Theft Auto IV has hung onto its top spot in the UK All Formats Chart this week despite a meaty 77 percent drop in sales.
It saw the acclaimed Rockstar game surge past the one million mark, as the format-favourite gap widened in Microsoft's favour: 62 percent of total sales were on Xbox 360, compared to 55 percent last week.
Wii Fit felt the burn a little and dropped 48 percent of last week's sales, but still managed to stretch its way to two.
Following on from last Thursday's Grand Theft Auto IV: PS3 vs. Xbox 360 Special, author Rich Leadbetter told me that he'd found an even more precise way of measuring average frame-rates and wanted to update you on this. He also thought it would be a good idea to answer a few of the more commonly asked questions about his methodology. The Frame Rate Tests section of the piece has now been tweaked accordingly, and here's Rich's commentary on it:
The Xbox 360 vs PlayStation 3 GTAIV face-off certainly caused some controversy across forums far and wide, partly because it contained what is most likely the first ever frame-rate test for a console game; tests we're going to continue in future face-off coverage.
Most of the controversy seemed to surround the fact that 360's results would be influenced by the inclusion of frames subject to v-lock screen tear. Over the weekend I worked with notable tech experts, including the now infamous 'Quaz51' in refining the frame-rate detector. It's now extremely sensitive to the point where it can detect frame-rate even on a static screen (i.e. a car moving at 0mph).
Even without the Eurogamer comparison feature, the internet has been set ablaze by GTA IV PlayStation 3/Xbox 360 face-off discussions. But mere digital incendiaries are not enough for a release of this magnitude. It's time to go nuclear.
Take-Two chairman Strauss Zelnick has denied that there are any technical problems with GTA IV. Unfortunately, he seems to have done this the day before Rockstar issued the now-confirmed PS3 patch we told you about yesterday.
Microsoft says that first-week sales of Grand Theft Auto IV reported by Chart-Track are "clearly demonstrating that gamers prefer the Xbox 360 version".
Grand Theft Auto IV sold 3.6 million units on its first day and 6 million units in its first week, according to publisher Rockstar Games.
That means it "surpassed all-time entertainment records for day one and week one sales by dollar value", apparently, notching up USD 310 million on 29th April and more than USD 500 million for the week.
The last time a game managed anything like this was Halo 3 in November, which achieved first-day sales of USD 170 million in the US.
Rockstar and Sony plans to patch the PS3 version of Grand Theft Auto IV today to improve the multiplayer experience.
Speaking to Eurogamer, a Sony source explained that the patch would help by "reducing the loads on the servers at GameSpy and hopefully the completely random hangs that some users have seen".
PS3 owners who bought GTA IV last week have had to endure problems connecting to the multiplayer service almost from day one.
Retail analysts Chart-Track have revealed 926,000 copies of GTA IV were sold in the UK during the game's first five days on sale.
514,000 of those were for Xbox 360, with the remaining 413,000 for PS3 - a split of 55 per cent to 45 per cent.
On day one alone, 631,000 copies of the game were sold. According to Chart-Track, GTA IV software revenue is bigger than the revenue of all other games during any week this year since the first seven days of 2008.
Xbox Live bigwig Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb has said more than 2 million Achievements were unlocked for Grand Theft Auto IV in just 24 hours, totalling over a whopping 15 million Gamerpoints.
Take-Two is seeking legal damages from the Chicago Transit Authority after it decided to pull Grand Theft Auto IV ads from buildings and buses around the city.
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has joined the hoo-haw over GTA IV, saying it'll make "goo-gobs" of money for Rockstar but dumm-kopfs of America's children.
Sony Computer Entertainment America has announced sales of PlayStation 3 have been boosted in the US following the release of Grand Theft Auto IV.
However, the company hasn't issued any specific figures. Instead there's just a statement from Bob McKenzie, bigwig at top shop GameStop.
"From our position, the launch of GTA IV has been tremendous in driving traffic to our stores, as well as providing a vigorous lift in PS3 console sales over this time last week," McKenzie said.
GTA IV adds many elements to the established series that fans have been clamouring for, such as a better combat system, cars that don't vanish if you leave them for two minutes, autosaves and instant mission restarts. Perhaps the most eagerly awaited feature, however, is the addition of online functionality. It's not strictly new, of course, since there have long been PC mods that allow players to romp together on that platform while the PSP off-shoot series has also boasted Wi-Fi multiplayer challenges.
US group Mothers Against Drunk Driving has voiced its disappointment with Grand Theft Auto IV for including a section where you can drive around while drunk.
Shopwatchers Chart-Track have revealed Grand Theft Auto IV broke a raft of records on its first day of sale, to the surprise of no one at all.
Day one UK sales stood at 609,000 units, beating the previous record for the fastest-selling game set by GTA: San Andreas (501,000 units).
GTA IV is officially Better Than Halo, at least in sales terms. Rockstar's latest epic is now the fastest-selling Xbox 360 title, with 335,000 units sold on the first day. Halo 3 previously held the record with 266,000 units.
Paddy Power is taking bets on Grand Theft Auto IV's staying power, offering odds of 9/2 the game will sit at the top of the UK charts for ten weeks, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
Jason Kingsley, CEO of Rebellion, told the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee yesterday that GTA IV should be shown more respect and "celebrated" as a British success, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
We're not going to pretend otherwise. Today is all about you-know-what to the exclusion of all those other we-don't-care-right-nows. But because we get spoiled rotten in this gig, we've already had a string of days spent you-know-whatting ourselves into a mild madness - and it's time to give something back.
You'll have read Tom's considered appraisal by now, of course, and we have irrefutable evidence that a lot of you are already falling under the spell of Liberty City. So now we're going to continue our coverage of GTA IV on launch day with a collection of gameplay videos showing off key new features in the long-awaited return of the series, plus some of our favourite moments so far. Remember: if you choose to play them back in this window, you can double-click to go full-screen!
It goes without saying that these being gameplay videos, they are also technically SPOILERS, but this is the Internet, so perhaps it doesn't go without saying. Also (are you ready to look behind the curtain?) we needed to include this paragraph to make the page layout work, so you're stuck with it.
Rockstar has finally launched the Social Club for Grand Theft Auto IV.
Once you've linked in your Gamertag or PSN ID, you can check out the various features, including reports on the cumulative amount of police activity in the world, and your progress towards various goals.
The LCPD Police Blotter tracks things like the number of worldwide police call-outs, weapons of choice, how many cars were stolen, shows crime hotspots on a heatmap of the city, and when you click on individual totals you can watch canned video from in-game channel CNT. Activity is "up 848,780,099% from previous day", apparently. Nice.
With GTA IV available today, Microsoft is continuing its campaign to remind people that Xbox 360 offers unlockable Achievements and will have downloadable content later this year.
Grand Theft Auto III was a "galvanising" factor in the games industry deciding to fight its corner, according to Ted Price, CEO of Ratchet & Clank developer Insomniac.
Microsoft has decided not to publish a new Xbox Live Arcade game this week, and comments on the publisher's Gamerscoreblog suggest GTA IV is the reason.
Assuming they're not hiding until Q3, everyone else will be kicking themselves. Ever since GTA III, they've all been standing on Rockstar's shoulders and leaping off in new directions, like war and destruction in Mercenaries, super-heroics in Crackdown, and goblins and Jean-Luc Picard in Oblivion. But Rockstar kept its eye on the zeitgeist, and GTA IV's big innovations aren't amazing physics, spectacular graphics and epic environments - although it has all those - but convenience and multi-tasking. There is no longer any wasted time.
There have been hints of this before: listening to Lazlow while you chased down gangsters, using disguised ramps to outrun the mafia; doubling up the entertainment. But GTA IV doubles up the interaction. The mobile phone is central to this, allowing you to make phone calls and text-message people one-handed while you walk or drive; networking, socialising, organising, and listening to that ringtone you downloaded for America's Next Top Hooker. It's a tool for manoeuvring between GTA's activities and gameplay ideas quickly. It feeds you certain missions, and lets you phone in the results. When you hear a song on the radio that you don't recognise, you can dial 948-555-0100 and the game will text you the artist and song name. The phone's well-realised, too; you even hear that interference noise when it's about to ring. When you fail a mission, you can answer a text to teleport yourself back to wherever you spawn after the cut-scene briefing finishes.
You also keep your weapons when you die, so as long as you're never taken alive, you can do just that. When you succeed, the game auto-saves. Once you've wined and dined your friends and family, you can use the phone to order supplies - Little Jacob the arms-dealer will pull up in an alley nearby, Brucie will fly his chopper to a nearby heliport, Roman will send a cab. The cabs are very useful. Any cab you see can be whistled for, or leapt in front of, its customers ousted and thrown to the kerb and the driver instructed to take you to a waypoint, social venue, or any of those familiar little initials on the mini-map that initiate missions. Hit a button and you're teleported there via a short loading pause. It's pricier to do, but hey, convenience costs. If you drive yourself, GPS navigation uses the mini-map to guide you to your mission-specific destination or waypoints. However you travel, you can look around with a free-look right-stick camera, and a button for locking the camera onto targeted vehicles and individuals assists with pursuits.
With Grand Theft Auto IV due out on Tuesday, you're probably wondering where our review is! The answer is that our review will be going up on Sunday at 5pm BST.
As with all good things, such as the weather and hats, that timing is subject to change, but we thought you would want to know the current plan so that you can stick your head round the internet on Sunday and find out.
In the meantime, of course, you can keep track of all the latest GTA IV news and assets on our Xbox 360 and PS3 gamepages. Hope to see you on Sunday, calling us names as usual.
Bonkers convict Jonathan Lee Riches has filed for a temporary restraining order against Take-Two, Rockstar, and the "newest Grand Theft Auto games", claiming inmates who played the titles will knock him out and steal his "gold Jesus cross".
Did you read part one of our interview with Grand Theft Auto art director Aaron Garbut? I thought so - I've always liked you. In which case you already know how a GTA game begins development, how characters and story are integrated, and why Rockstar prefers to be inspired by a real-world location rather than recreating one.
Grand Theft Auto IV art director Aaron Garbut has shed some light on how a GTA game comes together behind the scenes, revealing that the process is actually very organic rather than carefully planned.
Grand Theft Auto IV art director Aaron Garbut has said that the developers "never reproduce real world locations" in GTA games because it results in "hollow" environments.
Grand Theft Auto IV is finished. It's on the way to the shops right now, in a herd of lorries guarded by helicopter gunships and men who wear sunglasses indoors and keep touching their radio earpieces ostentatiously. The information they're being fed is that you can't have it. Not yet. Not for another week.
Take-Two has unsurprisingly revealed that Grand Theft Auto IV has been given gold status and is now on the way to shops ahead of its 29th April release.
As promised, Rockstar has started accepting pre-registrations for its online Social Club, and as added incentive to sign up they are offering to draw you.
Pandemic Studios has acknowledged that openworld action game Mercenaries 2 owes "a huge debt to GTA", but doesn't believe that players have to buy one and not the other.
Those of you wondering when GTA IV Social Club pre-registrations are going to start...are probably smart enough to have gone to the Social Club website and checked, but just in case and as a reminder to the rest of you: 17th April.
That's what we're inferring from the big graphic that says "Pre-registration begins 4.17.08", anyway. Sometimes our job is harder than this.
What's the Social Club? It's an online service from Rockstar that tracks your progress in games like GTA IV and builds exciting leaderboards. You will be able to input your Xbox Live Gamertag or PSN ID and use the site to see who's better and worse than you, with various additional leaderboards to be added over time.
Grand Theft Auto IV's 29th April arrival on PS3 and 360 has been widely, not to mention voluminously heralded as the defining moment of this generation of consoles. Cruising around Liberty City in high definition on the biggest LCD television in the world, you can easily tell why: where Vice City and San Andreas were only able to extrapolate from the GTA III base - albeit to record-breaking effect - getting to know GTA IV is a steady sequence of pleasant surprises and sensible reconfigurations. Liberty City may be, to borrow from the game's amusing website, "where the American Dream comes to die", but it's also where the Grand Theft Auto series has come to be reborn.
As some of you may have spotted, a wily YouTuber is circulating what claims to be the Grand Theft Auto IV introduction movie, but Eurogamer can confirm that it's a fake.
Rockstar has revealed details of the team-based and racing multiplayer modes in Grand Theft Auto IV, promising details of the co-operative and competitive modes soon.
Online retailers GAME, Play.com and Gamestation have admitted they will struggle to cope with Grand Theft Auto IV demand when it is released on 29th April.
Rockstar has shed some light on a handful of the multiplayer options in Grand Theft Auto IV.
Among its offerings will be the expected Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch modes, according to GameTap, which can be tinkered with by whoever is hosting. You can change the number of fighters on each team if you like, so one person could try to hold off 15 others - or you can fiddle with things like weapon types, police numbers, traffic, and pedestrians.
There's also a clever blip system you can turn on or off, which shows enemy locations when they move, but disappears when they stop.
Sony has dismissed the exclusive episodic content for the Xbox 360 version of Grand Theft Auto IV, claiming that a "large percentage" of gamers will be unwilling to fork out for it - at least to start with.
Sony America marketing man Scott Steinberg believes there is more than enough content in the launch version to keep you occupied.
"Perhaps [Microsoft will be] shipping some episodic content in the fall, but there is a whole lot of product shipping on the PS3 in April and I personally don't think there's going to be a huge percentage of folks who [will] jump into downloadable content for another price when they're still playing through the core product," Scott Steinberg told GameDaily.
Rockstar boss Dan Houser has said Grand Theft Auto has always been about looking "lived in", and is upset that some feel graphics have not been its strongest point.
Rockstar has lifted the lid on its Social Club website for Grand Theft Auto IV, which will record your in-game statistics and allow you to download songs from the sountrack.
Take-Two has labelled Electronic Arts' USD 2 billion buy-out offer as "inadequate" and "opportunistic", as EA attempts to take advantage of the struggling Grand Theft Auto publisher, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
Microsoft Entertainment boss Don Mattrick has given everyone the impression that online multiplayer in Grand Theft Auto IV will be exclusive to Xbox 360.
His comments came during a a podcast with MS community face Major "Larry Hryb" Nelson about the line-up of games for 2008 and what makes it special.
"[GTA IV] is an amazing piece of software and I'm really excited with its downloadable content and online multiplayer support. Again, that's something that's unique to 360," said Mattrick.
Rockstar has denied reports it almost gave the go-ahead to a Grand Theft Auto film last year, saying the company is "not interested" in bringing the series to the big screen.
It's rather quaint to think that just over six years ago, we were all a-twitter at the prospect of Grand Theft Auto III and its swanky new 3D world. "How will that classic top-down gameplay work in 3D?" we mused, like big silly things. "Could it possibly beat Driver?" we pondered in all seriousness. Aah, innocent times.
Rockstar has revealed fresh details about Grand Theft Auto IV ahead of its expected release in the next few months.
Among the most welcome changes are those to vehicular shoot-outs. Previous drive-by controls of aiming left or right (or forwards on a bike) are gone, handed over to the right analogue stick instead, allowing you to pinpoint tyres or trigger environmental obstacles like snapping straps holding logs on lorries.
On-foot combat reflects these changes too, now sporting a very Gears of War-like approach. Diving and skidding behind cover is fluid and done with a single button, while blind-firing and aiming from hiding spots is also in.
Take-Two has announced in a conference call that it intends to release more exclusive Grand Theft Auto IV episodes for the Xbox 360 in 2009, GamesIndustry.biz reports. (We might do some work of our own later. Who knows?)
Rockstar has released the long-awaited third proper official trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV, and you can watch it on Eurogamer TV right now! Convenient, eh? That way we get hits and everything.
The new trailer - dubbed "Move up, ladies" - follows on from "Things will be different" and "Looking for that special someone".
It mainly focuses on the game's cut-scenes, which play out in a similar fashion to those from past GTA titles. It sees Niko arrive in the US to meet his cousin Roman, only for it to become apparent that the latter's claims of an American dream realised were a bit far-fetched.
Rockstar Games is fiddling with Sellotape and generally fastening up the final bits of a new Grand Theft Auto IV trailer, which is set to go live tonight at 8pm GMT, which is noon in some other part of the world or something.
The new trailer will be called "Move up, ladies", and will add to our already considerably considerable knowledge about GTA IV - knowledge that we recently compiled in our Grand Theft Auto IV: The Story So Far feature.
To help get you in the mood for moving up the ladies or whatever Rockstar's preparing, the publisher has also pumped out some new screenshots drawn from the trailer, which show a view from under a bridge, a man on a motorbike and a pub.
Ever since Peter Moore's bicep set the clock running on 10th May 2006, the world has been watching and waiting, and Rockstar has probably been sleeping rather badly - albeit on rather more comfortable sheets than the ones it was soiling in October 2001 when Grand Theft Auto III first went on sale.
Excellently-named Take-Two chairman Strauss Zelnick has rebuked news organisations like this rubbish one for reporting that Grand Theft Auto IV's release date is more up in the air than it actually is.
Take Two has refused to narrow down a release period for Grand Theft Auto IV and will stay quiet until it is "utterly convinced" the game is ready, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
Having heroically declared that all modern games are rubbish just the other week, Atari founder Nolan Bushnell has gone back on his comments to some extent and paid tribute to Tetris, The Sims, Spore, Wii Sports, Dance Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero as laudable examples of innovation.
Analyst Michael Pachter believes Rockstar has delayed the release of Grand Theft Auto IV because it is struggling with development on the PlayStation 3, GamesIndustry.biz is reporting.
Take-Two has confirmed that Grand Theft Auto IV has been pushed back from its original October 2007 release date into fiscal 2008, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
A Most Wanted list you say? Cripes, whatever next: a Tips and Cheats pamphlet to go with Eurogamer's promotional Pacman Beach Ball cover mount? Still, it's the summer, there are precious few games around and, with an awful lot of new titles coming up towards the end of the year you might quite reasonably want to know which ones to keep an eye on.
On Eurogamer TV: Searching for that special someone.
Rockstar's second public trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV has gone live and we're mirroring it on Eurogamer TV.
Called "Looking For That Special Someone", the one-minute-six-second teaser begins as protagonist Niko Bellic is seen in a variety of scenes trying to track someone down. At one point a woman pleads with him to stop the killing.
The trailer also treats us to a few glimpses of things we've never seen in GTA before: hanging off the back of lorries, kicking in a door and shattering the lock, clinging onto a helicopter as it swoops over the city, and watching from inside a car as bullets impact against the windscreen and leave holes in specific places.
The second Grand Theft Auto IV trailer will be available in high definition through Xbox Live Marketplace tomorrow at 6pm BST (5pm GMT), Microsoft and Rockstar said this afternoon.
You'll also be able to download an exclusive GTA IV theme and gamerpics, if you're into that sort of thing. Quite why you'd replace the Battlestar Galactica one is beyond us, but then maybe you don't like Tricia Helfer? Is that it? You disgust me.
Anyway, those of you without Xbox 360s will be able to catch it (the trailer - not Tricia Helfer) on the game's official website at the same time.
Rockstar has released details of the Grand Theft Auto IV Special Edition due to launch alongside the vanilla versions in October and contain both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the highly anticipated game.
Take 2 has refused to clarify comments from chief financial officer Laine Goldstein that suggest the publisher received USD 50 million (EUR 37.3m / GBP 25.2m) from Microsoft for exclusive GTA IV episodic content, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
Take-Two has reconfirmed Grand Theft Auto IV's release date, while GTA-publishing subsidiary Rockstar has promised that a new trailer - called "Looking for that special someone" - will hit the Internet on 28th June.
The company was speaking in the aftermath of its second-quarter financial report, which you can read about on our sister-site, GamesIndustry.biz. Executives, responding to questions about GTA IV, said that it was still on track for 16th October in the US (19th October in Europe), and that the promised special edition would arrive on time as well.
CEO Ben Feder also said that "the release of Grand Theft Auto IV is going to have a material beneficial impact on the sales of PS3," according to comments recorded by GameSpot.
Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter has suggested that Take-Two may choose to delay the release of Grand Theft Auto IV in a bid to boost its financial results for 2008, GamesIndustry.biz reports.
New details for Grand Theft Auto IV have spilled their way onto the Internet, expanding on what we can expect when the game launches on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 this October.
The game will be as significantly different as GTA III was to the previous top-down crime capers, Rockstar founder Dan Houser told Game Informer, and will offer much wider choice and freedom to the player.
As we already know from the trailer, GTA IV will take place in Liberty City (New York) in 2007, and will revolve around an Eastern European fellow. This chap, the main character, is Niko Bellic - an immigrant in search of the "American Dream".
We know next to nothing about Grand Theft Auto IV or what you'll do in it, but that hasn't stopped various politicians and other public figures in New York from warming up their disapproval. Or rather, it hasn't stopped the New York Daily News from ringing them up and painting a picture.
Rockstar's lips were tightly sealed this morning, following last night's debut trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV.
When we asked it about rumours that the PS3 version would contain more content than its Xbox 360 counterpart, the publisher informed us it couldn't say anything at all about the title, declining to reveal any further information than was presented in last night's footage.
Grand Theft Auto IV will be set in New York, and looks to follow an eastern European man, possibly Russian.
Rockstar has released the first trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV, and you can watch it now on Eurogamer TV.
It will be set in New York and the main character appears to be of eastern European origin, Russian perhaps, sporting a heavy frown and suitable stubble.
"Life is complicated," he says, walking over the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan. "Perhaps here things will be different."
Rockstar has revealed we'll get our first look at its next-gen gangland adventure on 29th March, when a trailer for Grand Theft Auto IV will be shown across the Internet horizon.
Rockstar was unable to comment on what exactly we could see in the trailer, though we're sure it will be enough to ruffle Jack Thompson's feathers and make us dribble a little excitement in our news-pants.
Hopefully it will also mark the start of a real campaign for the game kept so rigorously under lock and key. All we know so far is that it will be launched simultaneously on Xbox 360 and PS3 in October, and that exclusive downloadable content will be made available for both systems.
Microsoft could barely contain its glee at being able to confirm exclusive downloadable content for next year's Xbox 360 version of Grand Theft Auto IV - but PS3 fans need not fear, as it seems the Sony release is also firmly in line to receive its very own dazzling additions.
According to a source close to Rockstar North, the team is working on exclusive supplemental content for both systems, which will be made available for download via Microsoft and Sony's respective online services after the game's release next year.
In case you missed it, Microsoft revealed at X06 that Xbox 360 owners will get "exclusive access to two downloadable, epic episodes of GTA IV via Xbox Live, each with hours of entirely new gameplay and available only on Xbox 360 just months after the release of the title".
Although some got a bit overexcited during E3 when Grand Theft Auto IV appeared on Peter Moore's bicep (and Xbox 360), this time there really is a Rockstar exclusive to talk about.
At X06 this evening, as you've doubtless already gawped, the platform holder revealed that it had asked Rockstar to "throw us a bone" - and said bone will take the form of two 360-exclusive extra episodes, offering "hours" of extra gameplay.
These will be released in the aftermath of GTA IV's main release, which is set to take place in October 2007 on both 360 and PlayStation 3.
Rockstar says that an image circulating around web-forums this afternoon, supposedly showing a TV screen running a debug version of Grand Theft Auto IV, is a hoax.
Why, look who's here! It's our old friend Internet Reports, with a brand new rumour for us to mull over - and this time it revolves around highly anticipated next-gen title Grand Theft Auto IV.
New details of who will be writing and starring in the first next-gen GTA game have appeared on IMDB.
Apparently, Rockstar president Dan Houser is set to co-write the script with James Worrall, who also did the script for several previous GTA games and Manhunt.
GTA III and Vice City writer Lazlow Jones (who also did voices for Liberty City Stories and San Andreas) is listed as a cast member, alongside Navid Khonsari - he's appeared in loads of Rockstar titles, and provided the voice for the porn host in Max Payne 2.
For those of you wondering why no Grand Theft Auto announcement materialised in Sony's pre-E3 conference yesterday, Microsoft answered the question tonight by confirming the game will ship simultaneously for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
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