To answer Foolkiller's point about the character's belonging to the gta 3 world, I understand that and if thats the direction Rockstar wanted to go then thats their perogative, my problem is that nothing was said about that decision in the pre release hype, and because of that i ended up spending money on a misguided pretence, as my main reason for investing in the game was to see the story continued. As i'm sure there are many other gamers out there like me I can only assume that the lack of information on the decision to start anew character-wise was purposefully witheld. Other than that i completely agree with you!

I was dissappointed, This was my first GTA game i've played in full (I played in the sandbox of my friends efforts before.) For one (like everyone stated) there is not enough to do in the city other than missions, it's too easy to loose the cops, and the game offers only short little nuggets on excitement in the missions.

Some good points in here, far from the "I hate GTA4 because it's cool to be different" sense you get in other places.

I wasn't really disappointed, but then this is all about expectations. The last GTA game I played was GTA3. I pretty much knew it was just a sandbox game in general with the missions tacked on. I play the GTA games as a way to just screw around and check out the story when I want to. I didn't expect GTA4 to be any different and that's what it was for me. Honestly I was impressed with the increased level of sandbox-ism in GTA4, simply because the city has a pulse of its own.

A lot of my friends have given me grief about how I don't like the "dating sim" or "ultra-realistic" elements in the game. They are thankfully optional, but I don't feel like it was time well spent - while watching tv or going bowling or whatnot is a nice addition to the game's immersion, I'm not sure if I really thought they were necessary.

I'd have to say that the Saints Row 2 trailer, which parodies this, explains it better than me. I wasn't really disappointed, but the praise it got was a bit over the top.

The one thing I am a little disappointed about was that when you pull the e-brake it all of a sudden feels like you are driving on Ice and you slide sideways forever no matter how fast you were going I feel like that should have been adjusted before the final release. I know if you do it properly you still can execute e-brake turns it's just that the cars seem to react unrealistically when you don't do it properly.

disappointed? not at first...let me break down my experience into chunks:

Hour 1
"YAY! GTA IV SCHWEET! And I got all this cool gear with it, Boy I'm sure glad i traded in some games for this awesome!"

Hour 5
"Yay! GTA IV" however this time unbeknown to me I said in a less enthused slightly slavic accent as that was all I was hearing for the first five hours

Hour 10
Eye twitching frustration as I'm forced to drive all over town for the most asinine things. I eventually wasted money on cab fair to expedite the process, only to find out that when arriving at half of these destinations I needed to jack a bloody car for the mission. oh and "Shut the fuck up Manny!"

Hour 25
Glad to see Manny dead a few hours back, but this is when I discovered the Liberty City Minute achievement and panicked. "I can do this, I can do this." I can't do this

Hour 45
After being ultimately frustrated with starting every mission over at least twice as I was torn apart by indistinguishable blurs on even my flat screen, I finally beat the game. "Awesome...ok now what?"

Hour 60
"STOP FUCKING CALLING ME!" All I wanted to do was tool around the city now, do some side missions and what not, but my "friends" keep calling me to hang out.

Hour 65
Ok, so they stopped calling, but by then I've finally burnt out. I can't be bothered to go find all those damn pigeons, or stunt jumps, or wanted criminals. Lets try multiplayer finally.

Hour 70
Fuck that noise... I thought folks on Halo 3 were bad, this is ridiculous! And goofing off in free mode is just boring as hell as no one's there. Oh and I get new outfits if I rank up? I HATE SYSTEMS LIKE THAT, GO FUCK YOURSELF...UGH...I wish I had those games I traded in back... *turns console off*

So yeah, a bit disappointed...

themightyodog:
To answer Foolkiller's point about the character's belonging to the gta 3 world, I understand that and if thats the direction Rockstar wanted to go then thats their perogative, my problem is that nothing was said about that decision in the pre release hype...

I think they did a bad job of informing the consumers about it but they did in fact mention this several times over the past few years. I am not surprised that most people didn't know this in advance though as the pre-release hype was about the game and not whether it continues the other characters' stories. Many, many (and I mean MANY) moons ago when Vice City was being developed and released, Rockstar made it clear that Vice City is NOT GTA IV. They pointed out that although the game is new, the world was the same. They mentioned it again when San Andreas came out that the numbering system would not be correct because GTA IV would start a whole new world. Of course, San Andreas came out a long time ago and most people either never heard of their reasoning regarding the titles or it has been forgotten since.

I do however agree that they should have made it more clear recently.

Cheers.

I wasn't really disappointed because I never heve high expactations hen I first begin a game. However there are a few things to complain about in GTA IV. Socialising is pretty boring after a while. A lot of weapons are missing and speaking about weapons: why do they give me 5 grenades in a mission right after I spent money on buying 25 molotovs cocktails. I also don't like it that killing the Most Wanted didn't have any reward, or that you have to kill all 200 flying rats to get something.

mwhite67:
The one thing I am a little disappointed about was that when you pull the e-brake it all of a sudden feels like you are driving on Ice and you slide sideways forever no matter how fast you were going I feel like that should have been adjusted before the final release. I know if you do it properly you still can execute e-brake turns it's just that the cars seem to react unrealistically when you don't do it properly.

As sad as it sounds in my geekdom, I recalled moments in the Initial D anime where the e-brake and regular brakes are used in tandem to create the right kind of slide. After figuring this out I figured out that depressing the regular brake after a quick tap on the e-brake gets me the "Drifts" I'm looking for. Not like it still isn't a bit overkill to watch you spin out at the wrong times.

Eldritch Warlord:
I'm surprised to see no mention of the hypersensitivity of the crontols in contrast to the sluggishness and choppiness of the animations. Sure, if I play on a new controller it's fine but with the slightly worn controller that I prefer Niko acts like a directionally challenged and eternally confused man on a meth high. Every other game I own works fine, every other aspect of GTAIV works fine. Why the H*ll is footwork so fraked up?

I found this too. When Niko's walking normally he's alright (well sort of), but the second that you crouch it's as if he's moving from square to square on a checkers board.

And Honestly, who jumps like that.

GTAIV kicked Halo off my "Most Overhyped piece of crap I have ever had to put up with" pedestal. That is one hell of an achievement, believe me.

I was impressed how much better it is than the other insallments. BUT i was talled, intensely, that the story was the best in the series, and as a novel writer in my spare time i will say that the story was much better but not that much better.