I liked it. But the constant cell-phone calls and the babysitting that came with it (especially Roman- couuuusin, you havn't called in ten minutes), drove me nuts.

The irony here is that there were threads and posts on this very forum declaring that GTA4 was the best game they ever played within the first 10 minutes of the game.

I wonder where those people are now...

If I know how to ride a bike and I decide to walk to work one day, I'm not going to be crappier at riding a bike when I get home. That's not how it works. If I know how to do something and then don't do it for a few years, I'll probably be a bit rusty. But that's okay, because it's easy to re-learn what you've already known.

Say they made a Zelda game where you get the sword, but you're absolutely terrible at using it, by default, and miss 99% of your swings. And you can't use Epona to ride everywhere, because then you'll get fat and slow, you need to run on your own to stay fit. People would get fucking pissed and you know it. But somehow when San Andreas does it, it's the best game ever.

No, it's not realistic at all. It was a poor implementation of an average idea.

gta4 was a downgrade from san andreas.

it well well over reviewed

From a gameplay and graphics perspective, it was very fun.  Just like every other GTA but with better graphics and far better physics.  What nearly killed it for me was the story.  All of the GTA games have been pretty funny, and GTAIV had some funny moments (all involving Brucie), but overall their attempt at writing a serious story with a tortured protagonist came off as hideously amateurish.  Every time I see a review call the story and writing groundbreaking or even very good, I throw up in my own mouth a little bit.  No GTA game has ever had good writing, but at least the previous entries were tongue in cheek enough to make it work.

I just found Nico execrable as a character.  He was written like shit, he was an annoying whiny bitch, and the voice acting was comically bad.  He sounded like the Count from Sesame Street.  Every time I was killing guys, all I could ever think was, "One headshot..  two headshots..  three headshots...  HA! HA! HA!"

Luckily TLAD somewhat made up for it.

Edit:  I agree with whoever it was earlier that posted about the phone.  FUCK YOU ROMAN.  Roman and Otis from Dead Rising could form a Super Villain club and take down the world with phone spam.

I also hated GTAIV because it was just one city, that wasn't well designed. At least GTAIII/VC had good design, and San Andreas actually felt like a proper state. That 'dead space' was quite cool. Great for a jetpack (no buildings out in the desert) and a 5* wanted level and mayhem. GTAIV was like a big shit wrapped in more shit.

 I just think ur post contain the answer : 

a lot of gamers (the ones that loved san andreas so much) just wanted a huge sandbox game to kill/drive/destroy everything

they dont care about story or realistic stuff

they care about explosion/shooting etc ...

they just wanted a sandbox game to play with

(I never played a GTA game but that is my 2 cents)

from NintendoMan's post :

I also hated GTAIV because it was just one city, that wasn't well designed. At least GTAIII/VC had good design, and San Andreas actually felt like a proper state. That 'dead space' was quite cool. Great for a jetpack (no buildings out in the desert) and a 5* wanted level and mayhem. GTAIV was like a big shit wrapped in more shit.

Its worth it to buy now at a cheaper price. I wouldn't say it was a bad game at all, but the story was kind of a let down and there wasn't as much to do on it as there was on San Andreas, I think they were just testing the waters of the newer gen consoles and the next Gta will be massive

i dont get it, it was an awesome game. people should stop complaining.

I agree.