Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars Preview
- February 26, 2009 12:06 PM PST
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Chinatown Wars is rewriting all the rules on the Nintendo DS.
Check out the new Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars trailer below!
It's been a long time in the making, but the Grand Theft Auto series is finally coming into its own on handheld consoles. Before Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories rocked the PlayStation Portable with solid PlayStation 2-level graphics and Wi-Fi multiplayer, there were three GTA games on the Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance that kicked it old school from a top-down perspective and straight forward race-and-chase gameplay.
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is best described as a perfect blend of the two eras, old and new GTA handheld games. The camera, for instance, remains positioned in the sky looking down on the action from an isometric view, just like the old days, except that the world is fully rendered using 3D polygons. The graphics are nowhere near as good as those featured in Vice City Stories or Liberty City Stories, but the hard-lined cardboard cutout look has a gritty pulpy charm all its own. More importantly, Chinatown Wars is set in GTAIV's teeming vision of Liberty City, and even on the tiny DS screen we spotted crowds of pedestrians, blinking turn signals, and flashing traffic lights.
Huang Tough
The story of Chinatown wars revolves around 25-year old Huang Lee, a low-level member of the Chinese Triad gang. Shortly after Huang's father is assassinated, he travels from Hong Kong to Liberty City to deliver his family's Yu Jian heirloom sword to his uncle. When Huang arrives in Liberty City, he is kidnapped and left for dead; worse, the family sword is stolen. All of this information is told through the game's opening cinematic, which boasts a graphic novel visual style. You pick up and play when Huang is stuffed in the back seat of a car and dumped in the ocean to die.
Or not die, as the case happens to be. Your first interaction with the game is to use the touch screen to break the rear window of the car and escape to safety. Obviously, Rockstar is utilizing the DS's unique capabilities and features, but in some very satisfying ways. While all the action is displayed on the top screen, the bottom touch screen lets you control elements like the PDA (for missions and info), GPS driving directions, the radio, or using Molotov cocktails and grenades. You can also whistle into the microphone to hail taxi cabs. This may sound gimmicky, but these features left us rather impressed - it's like a collection of micro-games built around an arcade-ier version of GTAIV.
What Recession?
While the DS functionality is a nice touch, the real fun comes in the diverse, action-focused missions. We played a variety of missions that ranged from throwing Molotov cocktails out of a helicopter to harassing rival gangs to drug trafficking, and they were all enjoyable. Drug trafficking is especially fun and could be a game unto itself. As you peddle six different drug types around Liberty City, you make a profit by watching the drug market conditions based on the city's geography. But watch out, some locations are monitored by security cameras that will alarm the police if you're caught pushing drugs. You can shoot the cameras, which serves as the game's secret packages, to lower the drug prices in the area. Or you can deliberately sell your drugs in full view of the cameras in order to artificially jack up profits.
Chinatown Wars is packed with content that spans the entire Grand Theft Auto canon. From the Liberty City locales of GTAIV to the return of Rampage missions, there's something for al GTA fans in Chinatown Wars. This could be the best game to hit the DS in all of 2009, thanks partly to Nintendo's slim release calendar, so don't space on that March 17th release date.
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- Feb 24 2009 at 11:31:02:AM PST
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I wish I had the Money to buy a DS :'( Once I get 1 thogh this is the 1st game I'm buying.
btw, first?
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Looks pretty sweet... but looks more like the first 2 GTAs with the top view. Still, it's GTA on DS, can't complain :)
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this is gonna be completly awesome!!!! thank you rockstar for making nintendo a gta game!
and hey, maybe since a lot more hardcore games are coming out on the wii this year rockstar could make a gta wii game!!!
that would be my dream come true!!!
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This actually looks pretty cool.. I was worried they were going to try and make it third person which would have been possible, but butchered in comparison to the PSP. Instead it's classic old school GTA with new gameplay elements.
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I know it would look like crap compared to the other 2 consoles, but they should really try to release GTA4 on Wii. The game is great, but the controls are absolutely horrible... and I think the IR pointer is exactly what GTA4 needs to make it better. Kinda like Resident Evil 5... it'll look WAY better on PS3/360, but after playing the demo, I really wish they would release it on Wii, because once you've played RE4 on Wii, going back to analog REALLY SUCKS. I like dual-analog controls for shooters, but for RE5 and GTA4, I would sacrifice graphics for Wii controls in a heartbeat.
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Toneman wrote:
I know it would look like crap compared to the other 2 consoles, but they should really try to release GTA4 on Wii. The game is great, but the controls are absolutely horrible... and I think the IR pointer is exactly what GTA4 needs to make it better. Kinda like Resident Evil 5... it'll look WAY better on PS3/360, but after playing the demo, I really wish they would release it on Wii, because once you've played RE4 on Wii, going back to analog REALLY SUCKS. I like dual-analog controls for shooters, but for RE5 and GTA4, I would sacrifice graphics for Wii controls in a heartbeat.I agree about RE5 on Wii, but I really can't imagine GTA IV on Wii. A new GTA made from the ground up would be much better. Set in San Andreas maybe?
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Crunch40 wrote:
Toneman wrote:
I know it would look like crap compared to the other 2 consoles, but they should really try to release GTA4 on Wii. The game is great, but the controls are absolutely horrible... and I think the IR pointer is exactly what GTA4 needs to make it better. Kinda like Resident Evil 5... it'll look WAY better on PS3/360, but after playing the demo, I really wish they would release it on Wii, because once you've played RE4 on Wii, going back to analog REALLY SUCKS. I like dual-analog controls for shooters, but for RE5 and GTA4, I would sacrifice graphics for Wii controls in a heartbeat.I agree about RE5 on Wii, but I really can't imagine GTA IV on Wii. A new GTA made from the ground up would be much better. Set in San Andreas maybe?
You can always dream, you know
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shotgunzzzz wrote:
Crunch40 wrote:
Toneman wrote:
I know it would look like crap compared to the other 2 consoles, but they should really try to release GTA4 on Wii. The game is great, but the controls are absolutely horrible... and I think the IR pointer is exactly what GTA4 needs to make it better. Kinda like Resident Evil 5... it'll look WAY better on PS3/360, but after playing the demo, I really wish they would release it on Wii, because once you've played RE4 on Wii, going back to analog REALLY SUCKS. I like dual-analog controls for shooters, but for RE5 and GTA4, I would sacrifice graphics for Wii controls in a heartbeat.I agree about RE5 on Wii, but I really can't imagine GTA IV on Wii. A new GTA made from the ground up would be much better. Set in San Andreas maybe?You can always dream, you know
50$ okay maybe i'll skip
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