Grand Theft Auto IV: Kikizo Preview 3

Our third GTA IV preview spectacular reveals exclusive new details for the first time anywhere, and takes a much broader look around Liberty City in a fantastic build of the game that's nearing completion.

Page: 1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8 

Page 2

So our journey on water starts at the northern tips of Alderney and Algonquin. We found a speedboat and jumped in. The water looks awesome, as we mentioned before, and a fine mist of drops splash onto the camera as the ride gets choppier the further away from land we go. We're going to go all the way south around Algonquin, get up close to the Statue of Happiness, and end up on the east side of Algonquin not too far from the Broker Bridge. This whole speedboat journey - basically around just half of Algonquin - takes a good five minutes of real-world time, which gives an idea of the sheer scale of the map.

During the boat journey, just like when you're in a car (or, we're told, any vehicle in the game for that matter) you can switch between cinematic camera or the traditional view which you move around with the right analogue. (There's also a dashboard view on the roads, we're told, which we'll check out next time). We first pass the docks where we'll later have a meeting with a character called Bell. Soon afterwards, we see the Statue of Happiness coming into view in all its glory. Further around at the southernmost part of Algonquin we can see an outside restaurant called Poop Deck, where we met with Francis McGreary [correct spelling this time!] in out last demo. (McGreary, by the way, has not been seen in any screenshots or trailers yet). The scrapers we can see in view next are in the financial district, and up ahead the Broker Bridge, with a big cargo ship nearby called Platapus, another place we've visited before.

With that impressive journey out of the way, let's jump into the game. We started right down the south of Broker, on a sunny morning, and it's time to head straight off to see a new character called Brucie, a bit of a livewire who you're introduced to by your cousin Roman. He runs a garage just around the corner from Roman's taxi depot.

Brucie's a bit of a hyperactive joker who talks really fast, darting on- and off-topic like a bit of a madman. If you want to imagine Brucie's voice as you read our transcript of this first conversation with him, think "Donkey out of Shrek", although this guy is white. By this stage in the game, you've already met him, so you're going to try and get some work off him for a mission. This mission is called Search and Delete. All our transcripts contain strong language from the game.

Brucie: I need you to whack some people, in their hide.
Niko: How do I find it?
Brucie: Man, you're cold! You didn't even blink! I love that! Fucking love that. You've got to steal a police car, get away from here, and give me a call.
Niko: Alright Brucie, I'll give you a call.
Brucie: ICE cold man! Ice cold! Woo!

Brucie takes his steroid intake pretty seriously, and he'll be consistently like this. Straight away, we're sold on today's demo on the strength of the voice acting. This is awesome voice talent, and fortunately, we're told these are now final voices. Characters also often look different each time you see them instead of perpetually wearing the same clothes like in previous GTAs.

Page: 1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8 

NEXT PAGE >>