For a game where there are at times quite a lot happening on screen and with the size of the levels I think it looks pretty good. If you start increasing the level detail on everything then you are going to have to cut something back. I like it this way. Also I don't believe they were ever aiming for gritty realism in the graphics. It has a slightly cartoony look to it to me and I think that was probably intentional.

"but some junky graphics for such a high profile game. "

GTA4 may not have the best graphics of this generation but from the trailers they are definitely not "junky". They look pretty awesome. Besides unlike for example Gears of War that could give you small perfectly adjusted areas. In GTA you need to render a complete city. Let's wait for the finished game until now I haven't been so fired up about a game by its trailers since Halo3. (And since I instead bought a PS3 I couldn't even play it damn.)

Yes.  And the amount of content requiring an install would only have been like 25gb!!!!

AWESOME!!! 

This thread should be locked.

You cannot expect top of the line graphics on a game as massive as GTA, simply because the game is so huge and there are NO LOAD TIMES. I mean if you wanted Gears of War graphics, you'd have to have a 30 second load time for every street, doesn't make a cop chase too exciting does it?

If you want an open world with no load times and the size of a GTA game, it's not going to be top of the line visually.

End of discussion.

I agree100%. I got a question though. Will it have sections of the city where there are load times, like san andreas, and vice city, most of the time when you cross a bridge, or will it all be load free.

Headline:

GTA IV graphics: not impressed

is like saying

Super Mario Galaxy graphics: not impressed

especially when you take into consideration how much content is in SMG and going to be in GTA IV

At least the graphics are better than the games on the PS2.

There are Wii games that look much better.

You guys got really spoiled really fast. GTA4 looks great.

Will pass on GTA 4. Graphics to me are the most important aspect of a game.