Day 3: Grand Theft Auto IV - Multiplayer

This was our last full day with Rockstar, so while they were busy setting everything up for the big multiplayer session later, the 10 of us headed to Central Park for a few hours. That wasn't before we ate lunch though. A short walk to Katz's Deli filled our stomachs before we were driven to Central Park. Our time at the park was fun, we saw a lot of pigeons, took a lot of photos, and witnessed Jordan attempt a Cloverfield parody on his video camera, which I don't think turned out quite as well as he had planned :p

On the way back from Central Park, we asked our driver to stop at 622 Broadway, the location of Rockstar's offices. We weren't sure what was going to happen, but we decided to try our luck and see if we could get in. We were met by a sligthly bemused and crazy receptionist, he said something which only a few of us managed to understand, but we knew we had been denied access. We walked back out and Zidane phoned one of the R* guys to see if they could let us in. Unfortunately they said they were too busy (probably playing GTA4) and told us to go away basically.

Multiplayer session

Back at the hotel, we were told to meet up at the penthouse suite at around 6PM. The PS3's were all gone and the room consisted entirely of Xbox 360s for us to play on - this was presumably because of the consoles better online facilities with communication and the like, and the included headsets.

Before I talk about what we got up to, I'll just say that the one difference you will notice when comparing the PS3 and 360 versions is that the PS3 does have a slight graphical advantage over the Xbox 360 version - overall the game appears sharper, and shadows aren't as jagged or flickery as they are on the Xbox 360. Aside from this, the versions are identical in gameplay.

Our first multiplayer experience was with a standard Deathmatch which I managed to win! Hooray for me. I think some of the webmasters forgot that the winner is the one who picks up the most cash, some just killed then moved on. How many shots it takes to kill someone is very variable, and it depends on how close you are and what gun you're using. For example using an SMG from far away will mean you're quite inaccurate so loads of rounds will miss the player completely, close up though you should kill them pretty quickly. Team Deathmatch was next, and the team I was on managed to win, so two wins in a row for me :)

My luck soon ended with the next mode up, GTA Race. I was taken out multiple times all round the first few corners, which meant it was impossible for me to catch up to Psy who ran away with the win and a massive lead over everyone. This is probably my favourite mode though, you can have so much fun in it. Especially if a few people set up huge roadblocks preventing people from getting past, and everyone just generally killing each other!

Cops N' Crooks was up next, and we've heard from many previews that this has been the most fun mode to play, and Alison even told me it's [Rockstar's] favourite mode too. However, our game was over really quickly since by the time we found a vehicle, the team who were playing as cops had already got to our boss! I can see that this game mode is going to be up at the top of most people's favourites. After this we tried a couple of the other modes, but it seemed we all liked GTA Race, and a few more team deathmatches. We played with different configurations each time. For example, one team deathmatch was played just with rocket launchers, that was a LOT of a fun. It's amazing seeing your friends fly 50ft into the air from a rocket exploding right in front of them.

More fun GTA Race's were played, we were messing around with different vehicle classes, and had races such as all of us driving firetrucks, or everyone in the ice cream van! Car Jack City was up next and this is where you steal cars and bring them to garages, getting money based on the condition it's in. Whoever steals the most wins. We also tried all the other modes, but I won't go into details about all those, I'm sure you'll have enough fun trying them all out for yourself.

We continued playing all through the night, at around 1AM though, many of us just went up to the rooftop to take in the spectacular views and talk about GTA IV and Grand Theft Auto in general. We also discussed the idea of posting stories about our trips on our websites, something we decided was a good idea, which is why you're reading this. During this time, Chess, Mark and Bill were in the hot tub and tried getting us to join them. Later on (after Bill had got out and presumably retreated to his bed), Chess did manage to entice a few of the webmasters to join her and Mark. She also came up with interesting nicknames for some us. Andy was aptly named "Ginger Andy", Psy apparently looks like Pete Doherty, so that name stuck for him, and more surprisingly, I earned the nickname of "Supermodel Chris" - apparently the reason behind this was that Chess thinks I look somewhat like actor James Franco, I don't see the resemblance myself, but I didn't mind the nickname either!

After a while of chatting, those of us not in the hot tub went downstairs to play more GTA4, and were eventually kicked out of the penthouse suite at around 4.30AM, when some us decided to sleep, and others just stayed up and watched TV. We all had a great night of GTA4 though.


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