Grand Theft Auto 4: A look back on an open world classic

 GTA 4 was once hailed as the pinnacle of technical achievement in open world design. A richly detailed city and a focus on gritty realism to sell the cynical and satirical life of Niko Bellic and others in the “land of opportunity.” But what happens when the standards of realism is elevated, when the technical achievement is thoroughly outmatched by the ever shifting rat race to make the biggest most detailed game? What happens when making your protagonist bluntly state the themes of the game is not enough? As you might have guessed, I don’t think the once pinnacle of open world games is all that impressive anymore.

Recently I had finished Red Dead 2 and despite sorely lacking in combat depth, I was thoroughly enraptured by its slow methodical approach to gameplay and the quaint humanity afforded to its wide cast of characters. I remembered below the satirical edge of GTA, the 4th entry attempted something similar so jumped back in to see how it held up.

What caught my eye immediately on starting was the brown and grey visual style it went for in the city. I can’t say that it was very appealing but I wanted to see if it was justified by the narrative. I tried making excuses for it, maybe they wanted to represent Niko’s humble start among Liberty City’s lowlife, or maybe it related to the themes of the game about how despite leaving his eastern European roots this city was the same with old and new vices.
But I fear it just doesn’t work. Moments of sincerity are few and far between and the darker tone are used as little more than cynical sarcasm. The story and characters are far too wacky, many nothing more than a caricature to justify the grim tone. When you’re driving with various flavors of clowns as companions, frequently crashing into cars and then shooting up a neighborhood worth of people for “amusing” reasons it’s really hard to take grim tone of the city seriously. GTA 5 and RDR2 did a much better job of embracing its silliness and realism respectively.

1 thing I keep hearing from fans of the game is how much better the story is compared to 5. I can’t compare since I haven’t played 5 since release but man does 4 have a really messy structure. Now credit where credit’s due, the humorous dialogues feel quite natural helped by amazing VA from all and Niko is a really well realized flawed protagonist. I really like his dynamic with Roman as both have quite an opposite approach to life but still very much care for each other. Roman’s insistence on playing by the rules and maintaining a constant optimism and faith in the American Dream is not played as some naivete but rather a tragedy of how the whole premise is false. Niko on the opposite side is a trigger happy maniac that doesn’t play by anyone's rules and on the surface is may look like he’s moving up in life faster but he’s also paving a path of destruction, living a highly dangerous life and still gets pushed around just as much as Roman by mob bosses above him. So despite lacking an ounce of subtlety in the themes of the game, I quite liked it. 

 

Problem is that’s where most of my praises end. The story lacks any form of structure as you keep meeting new people and doing jobs for them while having the carrot at the end of the stick being a vague revenge motive. This wouldn’t have been a problem if the game has a strong set of side characters or Niko’s personal investment in those stories. But most characters doesn’t have anything to offer beyond being amusing and Niko’s only motivation is looking for a pay check. This also where the “friend” mechanic fell apart for me as why would I spend time with characters I barely care about?

Lastly I come to gameplay and world design. Usually cities or location in an open world game take on a character by itself as you spend countless hours traversing it and engaging with the details and secrets it has to offer. GTA 4 might have been a technical achievement at release and even now is quite a large city but it absolutely isn't impressive or detailed enough anymore. I’m sure I sound like an asshole trying to bash an old game for not being comparable to newer games but I don’t do this without reason. That reason is that GTA 4 made a noticeable attempt at being realistic. Niko’s movement have long and deliberate animations, the cars feel really weighty and can’t turn corners fast, you pay a toll every time you cross highways etc. This is the same approach RDR2 took but unlike that game GTA4 simply didn’t have the tech to make an immersive open world. Streets feel too empty, there’s not enough shop or activity variety and too much of the city looks samey due to lack of detail. Thus when you couple an un-immersive city with dull gameplay, the whole experience becomes a slog.
And I didn’t even mention how dull the mission designs are. Rockstar games have never had great combat depth but in this game it feels specially lacking as you frequently drive slowly across long distances in a boring city only to shoot up a bunch of people in a building or drive some variation of vehicle that control just as bad as regular cars. In return of doing them your reward is some amusing humorous dialogue and money you have nothing to spend on. By themselves, each aspect they might not be that bad but the experience as whole was a chore to me.

I’m sure GTA 4 felt a lot better at release and I didn’t give enough credit to the game in this review. To mention one of them would be that despite disliking how the cars drove, I quite liked how distinct each vehicle felt. At the end of the day, I liked the concepts of this game far more than what it delivers.