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How I got addicted to GTA: Chinatown Wars

• By Patrick Shaw
• April 30, 2009 15:08 PM PST
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Slinging heroin, coke, ecstasy, acid, and making no apologies...

"GTA on DS, eh? Is that like watching an HD-broadcasted football game on a black and white TV?"Andy says. I know he's not a huge GTA guy, so to convince him that Chinatown Wars isn't crap, I bring up one of the game's finest features on my DS screen, its elaborate drug trading system. Games in the series like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas had missions involving drug dealing, but no game in the franchise has taken it to the level that GTA: CW does.

Weed, coke, heroin, pills, ecstasy, and acid can all be sold and bought from drug peddlers scattered throughout Liberty City. I show Andy that there's a good amount of strategy involved in trafficking dope in the game. To demonstrate, I pull up my map that tells me which parts of the city are populated by the most cokeheads, because that's what I have the largest supply of, set a way point and start driving. I meet up with the guy, sell him the blow, and make a profit of over two grand. I have some pills too, but if I sell it to this dealer in particular I'll lose several hundred dollars. I'm glad that this transaction doesn't turn out to be a police bust, which sometimes happens in the game.

GTA: Chinatown Wars is its own thing and not a watered-down GTA experience like Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories...

He seems convinced, so I go back to my game and blast through three missions during the rest of the train ride. I realize something while relaying to Andy all the reasons why I love Chinatown Wars and why he should play it too. Most of the things that make the game great, such as the remarkably imaginative uses for the touch screen (did I mention you can also squash cockroaches you find in dumpsters?), the ability to replay missions, and the sophisticated drug dealing system, are entirely unique to Wars. Unlike the two Grand Theft Auto "Stories" games on PSP, this game is not a lesser version of the GTA experience found on consoles. Instead of neutering what makes the series so beloved, fresh ideas are introduced in this DS exclusive.

Overall sales shouldn't dictate whether or not you buy a game...

I finally make it to the office, start charging my DS, and then boot up my computer. There's an article on Gamasutra talking about how the less than spectacular sales of both GTA: Chinatown Wars on DS and MadWorld on Wii has led analysts to believe that putting Mature-rated games out on Nintendo platforms is extremely risky. This may be, but should we as gamers even care about how well a game sells? Sure, this could mean that Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars 2 might not happen, but how many copies a game sells shouldn't influence your decision to play a game or not, right?

But don't just take it from me...

If you do a search for "Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars" on GameRankings.com, you'll see that the game has a 93% review score average, which makes it the highest-rated Nintendo DS game of all time (it's even on top of quintessential DS games like Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow and Mario Kart DS). Our own Will Herring awarded the game a perfect 5 out of 5 star rating in his review. So to end this story/brain diarrhea, I'll just say that if you missed Chinatown Wars, it's not too late to pick up the game and experience one of the best handheld games ever created.

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