The internet was grinded to a halt last night by the arrival of the first massive trailer of this year's biggest game, the legendary fourth instalment of Grand Theft Auto. Hit this link and download it now, in case you've just woken up.
After pushing our office hours to the very limit and wrestling with old Captain Bandwidth to get at the biggest video size possible, we've dissected to the GTA IV trailer thoroughly and picked out all of its little secrets you may have missed the first time around.
So magnifying glass in hand, here's what we've discovered...
It's Liberty City! Despite internet reports claiming otherwise, GTA IV is indeed set (at least partially) in Liberty City - or more likely Liberty State, the area beyond Liberty City. If you're still not convinced, you can see the words 'Liberty City' plastered on a docked tanker in the trailer, a ferry and of course there's also a glimpse of the 'LCPD' patrolling the GTA IV streets.
As you can see from the comparison screenshots at the bottom of the page, the layout of GTA IV's Liberty City seems to resemble we remember from the PS2 - though obviously there's a whole lot of extra detail washed onto the streets.
As for what's beyond the walls of the famous GTA III locale, the trailer confirms GTA versions of the Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty and a fun park including rollercoaster, which were all missing from the PS2 instalment.
The time setting While there's already plenty of debate over what time setting the next game takes place in, there are plenty of cues in the trailer to suggest a modern day setting for GTA IV.
The vehicles in the trailer all look pretty 2007 to us - including a BMW look-a-like and a sports car that has a very post-2000 design. There are also plenty of advertisements plastered around Liberty City that also cropped-up in the 90s-set GTA III, including Burger Shot and Cluckin' Bell.
Is that really the main Character? The narrator in the trailer is a Russian character whose background seems to revolve around murder, smuggling and erm, selling people. The internet is already shouting from the electronic rooftops that this Eastern European chap will be the main protagonist in GTA IV, but really the trailer confirms nothing of the sort.
What it does confirms is that the story will somehow bring Eastern Europeans into the equations, which leads us to wonder what's happened to the Leone kingpins from GTA III.
Hit the water Multiple-viewings make the GTA IV trailer's emphasis on water-based travel even more apparent; there are shots of bridges, ferry ports, a dock and some of the prettiest water effects we've seen to date in a sandbox game.
A realistically floating buoy 16 seconds in seems to suggest dynamic water physics for the fourth instalment, and of course you can see the gorgeous refraction effects later on in the trailer. A spot of boating for GTA IV seems a near-cert then, but - for as much as we hope - we just can't see jet-skiing going down in the Liberty City harbour.
Cast Your RAGE As has always been heavily assumed, the next GTA ditches Renderware to make use of the graphically-spectacular Table Tennis RAGE engine (Rockstar Advanced Game Engine).
The confirmation comes from a Rockstar representative who told Gamespot: "We can confirm that all footage in the trailer was captured directly from 720p gameplay running real time in our Rage engine on a next-gen gaming console."
And the engine seems to be working well for the series - as you can see from the trailer tech-wise GTA IV is looking very impressive.
Super Pedestrian We're expecting lots of advancements in how realistically the inhabitants of Liberty City live and work, but already there are a number of improvements on show in the short teaser.
At the beginning of the video you can see that the driver of the blue sports car is adjusting his rear-view mirror - a very nice touch indeed that we would never have seen working on the PS2. The pedestrians on the streets also have fully-modelled faces and carry groceries and books, which certainly adds a more realistic vibe to surroundings that the aimlessly-walking residents in GTA III.
The funny is back! Oldschool movie buffs will recognize the spoof reference in the GTA IV trailer straight away; the music is from Godfrey Reggio's Koyaanisqatsi, a dialogue-less documentary film from the early eighties that mixed landscape footage with a rolling soundtrack. The music, in case your wondering, is a piece from minimalist composer Philip Glass, who created the music for Koyaanisqatsi.
Further proving that GTA hasn't lost it's trademark humour are the plethora of fake adverts available for glimpse in the video, including upcoming TV show "America's Next Top Hooker" and "Sprunk", a beverage we probably won't picking up on the next trip round Tesco.
You can checkout the Koyaanisqatsi trailer here. Anyone for a cool glass of "Piswasser"?
Visit Vice City! Keen-eyed viewers with seriously-ninja Photoshop skills will notice an interesting in-game ad five seconds into the trailer. On the top left of the shot just above the wall is a sign that says "Visit Vice City - $300", leading many internet forums to explode with messages of "OMG!!11 MULTIPLE CITIEZ IN GTAIV!1"
So yeah, we might be getting a tiny bit ahead of ourselves taking this tiniest of glimpses as evidence that GTA IV will contain multiple, country-wide locals, but what would be more next-gen than a trip to all three cities that we've explored so vigorously on PS2? Having said that, would Vice City even look like Vice City in a modern day setting?
Doc Oc attacks! Another one for the eagle-eyed among us is the brief glimpse of a cable car travelling behind a bridge 30 seconds in to the trailer, leading us to fantasise over the Spider-Man-style mischief we could have jumping around fighting an imaginary Doctor Octopus.
Having said that, we're hoping Spidey's influence stretches all over GTA IV; we just can't look at that massive Crysler building without planning a Crackdown-style route up to the top, and it would be an absolute crime if we can't base-jump from one of those skyscrapers.
Clever birds Going from the trailer, we can see that the birds and pigeons in GTA IV are detailed and have some sort of behaviour system going on - which should please virtual game hunters everywhere.
In one scene you can see a seagull flying underneath a bridge, and in another we get a glimpse of two pigeons sitting on a statue. Will we be able to chase those dirty flying-rats through the streets? Pick them out of the skies with high-calibre rifles? At this point we'd bet money on it. (CVG doesn't condone the harming of pigeons).
Thanks to GTAForums.com for comparison shots (that have been stripped from the trailer). If you want to see the better quality shots, hit this link.
See anything we may have missed? Let the world know below.
So you can see us driving jet skis round Liberty City harbour. Have you all forgot what made GTA great. After GTA 3 we all screamed that we wanted helicopters n motorbikes. We got them in Vice City. Then we wanted more like planes and quad bikes. But they gave us jumbo jets so large you could hardly turn them, harrier jump jets, jet packs, parachutes, gambling, car custumisation, HGV's that you could attach the trailer to and the list goes on. You see we all know what to expect from a sand box and they deliver like saints row and crackdown but what you forget is rockstar seem to give you what you want and just that little bit more. We've seen the look of the new one but we haven't even scratched the surface of the interaction with the city. Oh yeah anyone remeber shootin pool in the pub near your home in san an before nipping to the casino parachuting down to the front door before having a few hands of black jack. THATS GTA BABY and i cant wait
"As you can see from the comparison screenshots at the bottom of the page, the layout of GTA IV's Liberty City seems to resemble we remember from the PS2 - though obviously there's a whole lot of extra detail washed onto the streets."
So what your saying is that this is just the same city layout as GTA 3, but tarted up a bit?
There was me thinking they had created a perfect repressentaion of New York, and just changed the names to not get sued.
I'm not sure about this Koyaanisqatsi people seem to be going on about, I watch that trailer and it seems totally different pace to the GTAIV clip personally my instant reaction is to go straight to the pop culture phenonomem that is the Matrix it too has clouds passing over a metropolis but leaves out the mountains, also I thing the music and pacing is more Matrix than what was shown in the Koyaanisqatsi trailer.
Also there seems to be some debate over the nationality of the character personally I thought he was middle Eastern rather than Russian
I think the guy in the trailer is the main character. If you take a look at all the cars that are shown closely you will notice that he is sitting in them.
Check in the last shot the theater "ME TV Theater"... "All About Me". I reckon you can watch back replays that you have saved of your action and FMVs etc. Maybe you can download clips through XBL of making-of and stuff like that.
I might be the only person to notice this, but "Top Hooker" isn't a movie. It's a parody of the next top model shows. The actual name: America's Next Top Hooker.
There was me thinking they had created a perfect repressentaion of New York, and just changed the names to not get sued. Sad
Actually i live in new york and that is an exact replica of the city, or is supposed to look like one. where is says get a life on the building is actually a building that says met life, some insurance company, in real life. and the building that they show that looks like a triangle is a real building too. so this looks exactly like the real new york city, just named different.
Personally, I like the movie poster for "I Slept With Your Mom" at 26 seconds... (Lower right-hand corner. Pink and white background.) The characters on the poster remind me of The Sims 2.
Visit Vice City! Keen-eyed viewers with seriously-ninja Photoshop skills will notice an interesting in-game ad five seconds into the trailer. On the top left of the shot just above the wall is a sign that says "Visit Vice City - $300"
Ummm where does it say Vice City at all on the billboard in the ad?
GiarcYekrub: Also there seems to be some debate over the nationality of the character personally I thought he was middle Eastern rather than Russian
Considering the protagonist talks about human trafficking, and Russia is king of that in the present day world, one would likely assume he is from Russia, and not the Middle East. So really there is no debate, he's Russian.
Check in the last shot the theater "ME TV Theater"... "All About Me". I reckon you can watch back replays that you have saved of your action and FMVs etc. Maybe you can download clips through XBL of making-of and stuff like that.
Damn you, I was just about to suggest exactly that! It could even be an online portal where you can post your replays online. It could even utilise the 360 camera...?
as previously mentioned in another comment, this is most definitely not liberty city, but a whole new city entirely completely based off new york city. also being a new yorker, you can easily spot the brownstones of bedford-stuyvesant, brooklyn can clearly be seen, the cyclone rollercoaster at astroland park, coney island can also be seen. on top of the extremely obvious brooklyn bridge, 59th street bridge (the cable cars are in existance today and take pedestrians to and from roosevelt island), times square, madison avenue triangle building, statue of liberty, chrysler building, a overhead subway that is either the 2 train at 125th street harlem or the M train by the Marcy Avenue projects of williamsburg, brooklyn.
as previously mentioned in another comment, this is most definitely not liberty city, but a whole new city entirely completely based off new york city. also being a new yorker, you can easily spot the brownstones of bedford-stuyvesant, brooklyn can clearly be seen, the cyclone rollercoaster at astroland park, coney island can also be seen. on top of the extremely obvious brooklyn bridge, 59th street bridge (the cable cars are in existance today and take pedestrians to and from roosevelt island), times square, madison avenue triangle building, statue of liberty, chrysler building, a overhead subway that is either the 2 train at 125th street harlem or the M train by the Marcy Avenue projects of williamsburg, brooklyn.
just thought i'd clear that up in detail on here.
What are you stupid?...
Did you NOT see the signt hat say "Liberty Tree"...Which Btw is Liberty City's official newspaper...Any GTA player knows that.
Also did you miss the boat saying "Liberty City"..or the sign saying "Liberteen" in BIG yellow letters?...
as previously mentioned in another comment, this is most definitely not liberty city, but a whole new city entirely completely based off new york city. also being a new yorker, you can easily spot the brownstones of bedford-stuyvesant, brooklyn can clearly be seen, the cyclone rollercoaster at astroland park, coney island can also be seen. on top of the extremely obvious brooklyn bridge, 59th street bridge (the cable cars are in existance today and take pedestrians to and from roosevelt island), times square, madison avenue triangle building, statue of liberty, chrysler building, a overhead subway that is either the 2 train at 125th street harlem or the M train by the Marcy Avenue projects of williamsburg, brooklyn.
just thought i'd clear that up in detail on here.
What are you stupid?...
Did you NOT see the signt hat say "Liberty Tree"...Which Btw is Liberty City's official newspaper...Any GTA player knows that.
Also did you miss the boat saying "Liberty City"..or the sign saying "Liberteen" in BIG yellow letters?...
Liberty City was originally just a fictional city based loosely on New York City, with all the names changed to prevent being sued. Now with the new generation of consoles they can acuratly model the real New York City. But of course they are keeping the made up name of the city and all the other fictional parody names. This is plainly obvious to anyone who has been to New York City.
So to all the cry-babies out there who don't know jack about the real world - GET A LIFE -
Ok not to say im any smarter than anyone on the forum, i will point out the Common Sence approach. I am a die hard GTA-er, like most of you.
First, obvious thing, the trailer shows the FREAKIN statue of liberty. Hmmm I wonder where that is, NEW YORK...So renamed or not how can you deny that.
Second, in the character intro he is using first personology. I did this and I did that, then he wonders if it will be different there. Making us, of course, wonder if it will be different there for HIM (placing him as the main character.)
Third and last, The article was awsome, very analitical. As always its fun to speculate, like all you ghost hunters still looking for aliens and bigfoot in SA, stop. I'll admit in VC it was cool to go back to GTAIII if only for a moment. Maybe we go back to zeldaland or Metalgearville in GTA 6, does it matter. All I know, just like always, when the game arrives im taking a few days off and beating it first.
Whats up with Flying and swimming,show some screens on this stuff,am I right? how many of you will buy this game if it features no flying or swimming? All of us still will! but please Rockstar, throw in some hidden air "packages" to collect,and some hidden underwater "packages",also,the R.C. minigames, are they back as well?and last but not least, I , personally am Not into the "Online Thing",and consider myself as one of the last "Sole" gamers out there who enjoys a 1 player game.Please make this game as good for the "sole" gamer as the "online" ones.
"The music, in case your wondering, is a piece from minimalist composer Philip Glass, who created the music for Koyaanisqatsi" You should have used you're, I expect better from someone being paid to write this stuff.
The narrator in the trailer is a Russian character whose background seems to revolve around murder, smuggling and erm, selling people. The internet is already shouting from the electronic rooftops that this Eastern European chap will be the main protagonist in GTA IV, but really the trailer confirms nothing of the sort.
What it does confirms is that the story will somehow bring Eastern Europeans into the equations, which leads us to wonder what's happened to the Leone kingpins from GTA III.
that means they're gonna get taken over by polish plumbers as well?
I dont think the game is not constricted only to liberty city i think that this is where you start the game off at and then are able to move to vice city, then san andreas possibly. The first video relase was of NYC(liberty city) the next should be of Miami(vice city) then LA, Sf LV (san andreas). They wouldnt make a remake of only one city thats unlike them. YOU start off a Liberty city then gain acess to vice city then access to san andreas. in all the games they are areas at first that are blocked off i think Vice and San An are those areas
Doc Oc attacks! Another one for the eagle-eyed among us is the brief glimpse of a cable car travelling behind a bridge 30 seconds in to the trailer, leading us to fantasise over the Spider-Man-style mischief we could have jumping around fighting an imaginary Doctor Octopus.
I hate to be a total geek, but in spiderman 2 spiderman fought doc oc on top of an elevated train, not a cable car. It was in the original spiderman that spiderman had to save mary-jane and a cable car full of kids both dropped by the green goblin. Green Goblin = cable cars, Doc-Oc = elevated train. Again, excuse the geekiness.
Would anyone actually like it if they completely re-made New York. Spiderman 2 did just that nearly and endless blocks gets a bit boring.
I always like the way the GTA games condenesed everything so there would only ever be a couple of similar streets.
Real cities are quite boring in video game form. I wouldn't want this game to be any bigger than San Andreas, just more detail and stuff to do within that space.
I think this one will probably just be Liberty state and then the next game will be a west coast setting.
When i first watched the trialer i was like wow is it me or the graphics suddenly got better, not to mention the map that was amazing but i dont think that liberty city should have been the map area i mean gta:III and gta:liberty city stories has a really rubbish version of the liberty city map and then GTA:IV comes in with this massive version of the liberty city map. Personally i think evrything about GTA:IV is fantastic but i still cant see why its set in liberty city. Graphics:10/10 Layout:9/10 Story:10/10 TOTAL:10/10
The trailer looks brilliant!Rockstar always gives a bit more and thats awesome!San Andreas was my favourite but Gta IV is gonna be revolutionary!The amount of things gamers could do in San Andreas was unbelievable,you would never get bored!Although in a cut scene in san andreas shows C.J going to liberty cityi cannot stop but wonder if Rockstar would actually include snow in the game!?One thing would be cool if when it actually snowed,the actual character could actually start a snowball fight,and throw a snowball at a policeman and get chased!-but then again and sadly aswell it doesnt look like thats the sort of character who would actually do it(if thats the actual character shown in the clip)-looks more of a thing C.J would do!I'm also hoping to see skateboards and roller blades aswell!(but then again all that wouldve probably been already included)One thing i was impressed in the GTA IV trailer is when the character adjusts his mirror and he is actually in a convertible,i just hope theyve designed a way so gamers can actually put the roof up when its raining or when the roof is down you can see the characters hair move if its windy!I wish i was on the team who designed the game,ive got so many ideas but then again so has many other GTA fans.Well countdown has started gamers,cannot wait until its out for loads and loads of hours of play.
The game won't just be New York (or liberty city) nor will it be the New York state (or liberty state). The game being set in a city has been done, twice (GTA: 3 and GTA: Vice City). The game as also being set in a state (GTA: SA). I think that GTA: IV will be set in multiple states were you can fly between them, or swim, or drive, or walk, or pogo stick (who knows what RockStar has in store for us). One thing is for certain this will be the biggest GTA yet.
I think it would be great to fly to other areas, but seeing as this was supposed to introduce a European city to the series, and seeing as the main character is eastern European, i would be very disappointed if you were not able to fly internationally!
Imagine people traffiking between Moscow and LC, or drug running from LC to Paris/London! Now that would be truly great.
I hope it represents NYC. I'd love to go to the same places in The Godfather, like i love to do in True Crime: NYC. Little Italy, Brooklyn, wherever... Just to visit all those places at different years to see how each game shows them and how they have changed throughout the years. I also find this a great tourist attraction really. I mean, I haven't been to any place in America, and to be given that chance in a game form (costing the smallest amount of money) and being able to see it any time you wish in the safety of your house is just a great experience for those who enjoy travelling but havent got the money, just like foreign Getaway players being able to see Central London without paying s**t loads for a plane ticket.
Does anyone remember the original GTA on PC? That involved all three cities (Liberty, VC and SA), so could easily be conceivable that all will be used in GTAIV.. The post about International travel is interesting, but a little much perhaps? also read somewhere (apologies for not remembering where) that Rockstar are gonna try make this one as realistic as possible.. Maybes very little flying, no cool gadgets and s**tloads of police.. all said and done, you KNOW that this is gonna be a quality purchase that'll eat up a fair chunk of your social life!!
It's a sad day when this worthless drivelling minutae of an article gets thousands of diggs whereas more considereded approaches to the subject are ignored.
Here's a review of CVG review of a one minute trailer: http://idlethumbs.net/display.php?id=265
After getting very excited bout this game i decided to dig out the san andreas, an now im even more excited but anyway. the point i wanna make..... in one of the missions for Big Smoke he talks about a russian who is just off the boat and killed his cousin?! hmmmmm mayb im jus jumpin the gun but mayb this proves wel b able to go 2 all the citys. pls ne1 state ur view if u noticed this in gta: san andreas.
AND FOR ALL U DOUBTERS WHO THINK THEY ARE GOING OFF THE RAILS AND STARTIN A NEW STORY LINE.... MAYB THIS PROVES ITS GONNA ALL TIE IN!!!!
Copyright 2006 - 2009 Future Publishing Limited, Beauford Court, 30 Monmouth Street, Bath, UK BA1 2BW England and Wales company registration number 2008885
.
