Action Figure World

Something of a departure from Webkinz and My Little Ponies… During my trip to the New York Comic Con, I was lucky enough to get a chance to try out the preview demo of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, for the Nintendo DS. My initial impressions were mixed: I was used to following the action on the touchscreen and the map/PDA/GPS looked complex, the line-up behind me made me rush through the mission and the DS graphics seemed far too simple and weak for the world of Liberty City, a throwback to the original Grand Theft Auto we’ve long left behind. I left it figuring it could be a decent cheap buy, but altogther too removed from the games that have taken the world by storm. I was dead wrong. I head seen some great reviews for the game before I headed down to buy something new for my DS, but I had kept my initial impressions and was hesistant to actually pick it up. When I got there, though, there were few games worth purchasing, so I decided to give GTA a chance. And I am so glad I did. This game (rated 18+ and easily living up to it) is a masterpiece. Returning to the birds-eye-view of the original, the cut scenes are cel-shaded comics in themselves, the dialogue is as crude and snappy as ever, the double-entendres as ironically cheesy and the gameplay–oh, the gameplay. On top of the fact that driving through Liberty City is just as fun on the DS as it has been elsewhere, gamers will be floored to discover how much Rockstar has managed to cram into GTA:CW. Voice samples, dozens of missions, an incredibly massive, highly-detailed map and an excellent storyline. This might actually be one of the best games ever to hit the DS and with a ton of the game still left to play even after you’ve ‘completed’ your original tasks, you’ll be clamoring for a sequel the moment you get started. Rockstar, please deliver!

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 12th, 2009 at 5:06 pm and is filed under Con reports, Video Game Toys. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.