Grand Theft Auto IV returns to Liberty City

Stephen Withers
Friday, 30 March 2007 07:24

Your IT - Entertainment

Grand Theft Auto IV, the next game in the popular but often criticised franchise, returns to its original 3D location: Liberty City, Rockstar's thinly disguised version of New York.

The trailer shows various New York landmarks including the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State, Chrysler and Flatiron buildings. The realism is overlaid with fictitious elements such as the GetaLife building, a ship ('Platypus') registered in Liberty City, and ads for the 'Heart Stopper' Burger Shot hamburger, Max Renda makeup and Sprunk lemonade.

The trailer ends with a voiceover in an Eastern European accent: "Life is complicated. I killed people, smuggled people, sold people. Perhaps here, things will be different."

GameSpot quotes a Rockstar spokesperson as saying "all footage in the trailer... was captured directly from 720p gameplay running real time in our RAGE engine on a next-gen gaming console."

Taking that at face value, GTA IV is going to be visually very impressive, but we'll have to wait and see whether similar advances in gameplay have been achieved by the Scotland-based development team.

Grand Theft Auto IV is set to ship in October for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Its price and rating have yet to be revealed.