Dan Houser, the vice president of Rockstar Games recently gave a 90 minute preview to the Associated Press (AP) which bore just a few new snippets of information. The Boston Herald published an article yesterday which gives a couple of noteworthy points.

The only new bit of information given is the fact there will be over 100 fictitious in-game websites to access from Liberty City's computers, one of which is LibertyCityPolice.com. The other interesting point was Dan Houser talking about his favourite mission in GTA IV.

players are tasked with assassinating a character who’s laid up in the hospital. How gamers achieve this goal is completely up to them, whether they decide to quietly sneak in through a window, boisterously bust through the front door guns blazin’ or don scrubs and simply turn off the mark’s life support.

"We’re giving the player choices without ramming it down their throats," said Houser. "They even have a choice at the key moment in the whole story. I don’t want to go into too much detail about it, but I think putting that into the hands of the player is very fun."

You can read the full article if you're interested, but apart from the aforementioned snippets there's nothing new.

You may remember a news story before Christmas last year about a couple of advertising posters for GTA IV that appeared on the streets of Belgium. Those weren't final versions and were not meant to be put up. However, it appears the final versions are now in circulation thanks to a photograph from Flickr user freshyill.

The poster shows an email address, [email protected], which if you send an email to will auto-respond with a piece of artwork and message informing you they're all out to lunch.

The email response: see it here

Thanks Adriaan

American retailer BestBuy has added 3 new screenshots to their GTA IV product page. Unfortunately these are only low-res versions but we'll hopefully have higher resolution images available soon.

Source: GTAForums.com topic

IGN Australia have a new article up discussing the euphoria middleware developed by NaturalMotion, which is being used by Rockstar Games in GTA IV. The article goes into detail about how we'll see the euphoria technology used for amazingly realistic physics in the game. Here's just one quote from the article describing one example scenario:

During car chases, this also comes into play pretty spectacularly. Niko, as well as enemies in the game, are affected by inertia – to the point where rear-ending a car causes people in the front to fly through the windshield and into the air, arms in a controlled flail. The impact is sickening and realistic; bodies don't just ragdoll in GTA IV, they roll end over end or side-on, before coming to a natural pause.

Read the full article at IGN for more on this interesting subject.

Thanks Adriaan

Four new screenshots have emerged from Dutch gaming website Power Unlimited. Unfortunately they aren't high resolution but we're hoping we'll have these for you soon.

Thanks Ruudeke.

UPDATE: We now have the full size screenshots.

But not entirely. Jeronimo Barrera, President of Product Development at Rockstar Games was recently interviewed by MTV, when asked about the delay he said:

It's really no surprise to anybody that the PS3 was definitely a contributing factor to that. Now, we're neck and neck. That's not an issue anymore. But back then that was something we were taking into account. That's not to say there's anything wrong with the PS3 version. It's awesome. They're both identical.

And on a sidenote, Barrera also confirmed that cheat codes will indeed be available to use in-game:

"For gamers who only want to cause havoc, the game will offer that and the standard amount of weapon-unlock cheat codes."

Thanks to Jordan for the heads up.

Well, it appears that Rockstar Games have just announced the official release date for Grand Theft Auto IV.

Rockstar Games, a publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. is proud to announce the release date for Grand Theft Auto IV, the new title in the genre-defining Grand Theft Auto franchise. Developed by Rockstar North, Grand Theft Auto IV will be simultaneously available for Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system and PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system and will be in stores worldwide on April 29, 2008.

"We are so excited to be releasing Grand Theft Auto IV," said Sam Houser, Founder and Executive Producer of Rockstar Games. "We've pushed ourselves very hard to make something incredible and hope the game sets a new benchmark for interactive entertainment."

See it for yourself over at Rockstar's official site and read the press release.

The websites we mentioned in earlier posts are all publishing their previews and new media from R* today. New, unwatermarked screenshots are at the bottom of this post.

Websites with new content: IGN, GameSpot, Kikizo, GameSpy, ComputerAndVideogames, GamesRadar, TeamXbox, VideoGamer. Based on the sheer amount of information covered, we suggest reading Kikizo's mammoth 8 page preview - they even drew a map of Liberty City from memory! Below is a brief summary of some of the new/updated information from the previews, however, I recommend reading one of the full previews if you want to know everything.

• Websites received a 90 minute demonstration
  
• The stuttering frame rate has now been smoothed out and the city is now fully populated
  
• A new style of wanted meter has been implemented - this has already been briefly mentioned, but in case you don't know, "A circle appears on the map around your car and if the cops are outside that circle the wanted status will decrease."
  
• Drive-by shootings are now easier - "In an example of the increased physicality of the new GTA, Niko smashed out the driver's side window with his elbow before pulling out a pistol. Indeed, guns can now be controlled with the right analogue stick, making it easier to shoot out tires to end a chase quickly."
  
• GTA IV will now auto-save progress after important mission way-points.
  
• If you fail a mission you'll be given the option to jump straight back in and have another attempt, using text messages on Niko's mobile.
  
• Currently two minutes equates to one hour of game-time, although that is subject to change.
  
• Niko can listen to music whilst on foot, using the phone. "Sound quality is, as you'd expect from a mobile, realistically tinny and having the soundtrack accompanying you on foot is a welcome addition"
  
• Liberty City has a subway system which Niko is able to use.
  
• It took roughly 5 minutes (real time) to pilot a speedboat round half of Algonquin.
  
• A new character called Bell is revealed
  
• Characters wear different clothes instead of wearing the exact same outfit through the entire game (as in previous GTAs)
  
• Building relationships with characters is important. Some will meet you rather than you meeting them. Being on bad terms with them won't help you.
  
• Pool, eating, darts, bowling and going for a drink are some of the activities you're able to do (using the phone to access them)
  
• There is a radio station called IF99.
  
• In this demo, the cell network is called Badger whereas in previous demos we learned it was called Whiz.
  

Once Niko has the car away from the attention of the cops he can access the police database, via the onboard police computer. By tapping in the name of the informant Niko is able to pinpoint his home address – Long Street in Broker, which would be our next stop. Interestingly, Rockstar mentioned it would also be possible to upload photos of people from your phone's camera into the database to attain details as well

The new previews and screenshots we reported about last week now have an exact time of release, 5.30PM GMT tomorrow according to ComputerAndVideogames.com. C&VG is just one of the sites that recently visited R* for a preview of the latest demo, and will be posting brand new GTA IV information and screenshots tomorrow along with other sites including IGN, GameSpot, Kikizo, GamesRadar and 1UP.

Keep your eyes on TheGTAPlace where we'll be reporting all the new, important information and images.

In the next couple of weeks we can expect to see new GTA IV previews and screenshots from the major gaming websites including IGN, GameSpot, Kikizo, GamesRadar, CVG, and 1UP. Rockstar have been or will be demonstrating the latest build of the game to the respective websites so we should have some new information and media with us soon. We'll post as soon as the previews are published. Stay tuned.

That's according to German gaming website Cynamite.de. The site claims that an unknown Rockstar spokesperson has confirmed that a fourth trailer for GTA IV will be released before the game comes out, and like previous trailers will show cinematic scenes rather than actual gameplay footage.

No release date for the trailer has been announced by Rockstar as of yet, but we'll keep you updated on that.

Link: Cynamite article (translated)

Thanks to Stallone on our forums for this and everyone who emailed.

GTAForums member BlueSpot has spotted what could well be the map of Liberty City in a scene in the third trailer. The screenshot (below) shows what we believe to be the map. From the left we can assume this would be Alderney (cut off), Algonquin in the middle, Broker on the right, and Bohan at the top.

Obviously we can't tell for sure due to the lack of detail, but it's an interesting find nonetheless.

A few months ago we posted a couple of fan-made videos by Brotha, showing his excellent remakes of the first and second GTA IV trailers using GTA: San Andreas. Brotha has now finished his remake of the third trailer, "Move up, ladies" (which if you haven't seen it yet, go here). The trailer is embedded below for easy viewing, or you can go directly to the GameTrailers.com page.

Enjoy, and Happy New Year everyone!