Review: Grand Theft Auto IV: Return to Liberty City Lives Up to the Hype

Seven years after Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto IV hit the stores Tuesday to sell out crowds and a waiting audience. Locally, the chain video game stores sold out of their first shipment on pre-orders alone and Best Buy ended release day with just a few copies of the game in the store.

GTA IV was the first major game released simultaneously for the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360 and it marked a return to Liberty City after the most recent Grand Theft Auto titles took us to San Andreas and Vice City. Liberty City, modeled after New York City, is the home of all the numbered GTA games and Grand Theft Auto IV is no exception.

The all new maps of the city and the rendering of the city of itself make this return to Liberty City a happy return home.

I have never played a GTA game personally, but I have watched hours and hours of Grand Theft Auto played first on my Play Station, back when it was an overhead game, and then all three major GTA titles and Liberty City stories played from beginning to end on my PlayStation 2.

We had avoided by the latest generation of gaming console until last week. We had been leaning toward purchasing an Xbox 360, particularly because we were interested in "Dead Rising", a zombie game infamous for creating the three-rings of death signaling a fatal error in the Xbox 360. But Microsoft announced last year that they would extend the manufacturer's warranty to cover this fatal error and game support for the PS3 has been somewhat lacking. So we were leaning toward the Xbox 360 anyway.

With the release of Grand Theft Auto IV, it was time to make a decision and the decision was: Xbox 360 and GTA IV together with a $50 gift card from Best Buy for getting them together. Personally, I was happiest with the gift card. I didn't anticipate playing GTA IV; it's not the kind of game I enjoy.

At first, my husband was a bit concerned that this GTA title might not live up to the fanfare and the reputation of its predecessors. He got literally days of playing time, at least 60 hours, out of GTA: San Andreas and was disappointed to see that this chapter had returned to Liberty City.