Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories Review (no fat)

Game Description

The famous Grand Theft Auto series takes control of the PSP as players revisit the GTA 3 map with a completely different storyline. In Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories, Tony Cipriani is the returning and main character, throughout an adventure where Salvator Leonne is the big cheese.

With loads of special features, full voice acting, and PSP specific missions, players will enjoy the first true open ended game on the PSP.

GTA: Liberty City Stories – Fact and Fiction

It would be easy to brag about the new storyline and incredible graphics of LCS, but the feature list comes with its share of nags.

The story follows Tony Cipriani, a returning character in the series. Tony, along with a couple of others, makes his way back only on the handheld. The whole scenario works great, and its even better to hear and see the well done voice acting in the cinematic's.

The story unfolds in typical GTA style, with mission based objectives advancing the story and getting you cash. The cinematic's themselves don’t really take up much load time and, consequently, there is a flow to things.

Missions are up and down, and start usually with boring ones in the beginning. Since this is on a handheld the mission structure had to change to compensate for the player on the go+battery life, except they forgot to cut out the long commute to complete certain jobs.

A lot of the time players will find themselves cruising around the ridiculously large city to fetch a mission, and then riding around to complete it. If anything the wishy washy analog controls will get a lot of workout, to the point where even the most finicky gamer will get used to them.

There are more mini-missions to keep players busy like a noodle guy, pizza guy, or get this: a car salesman. That is just plain creepy, yet some of the most fun to come out of the PSP.

This game requires a 2.0 update in order for it to work on the PSP but the update comes free with the game so there aren’t too many hassles involved.

GTA: Liberty City Stories – Weapons

Weapons are abundant, but in all cases are extremely frustrating to use. Many of the weapons require you to aim while you stand absolutely still… which is completely unacceptable in a game where you have multiple enemies after you, and even the lowly granny passing by on the street is packing heavy heat.

The aiming function itself is flawed, and will often have you targeting people you don’t want dead. On the up side, it is a blessing that auto-aiming is even in, for GTA on a handheld, would have been simply unplayable without it.

GTA: Liberty City Stories – Saving

In one of the most annoying moves in a handheld game GTA has incorporated save ‘spots’ as opposed to other saving methods. The caveman-like saving points are few and in the massive Liberty City it can become quite the chore to balance battery life with whether or not to take a mission.

This is even an issue for players with extra battery packs, the idea of having to go to a certain spot to save when say, you are on a mission and 3 cop cars and criminals are after you makes it extremely hard to keep pace. This is by far the game’s weakest point and can lead to a lot of unfinished goals and frustrated gamers.

GTA: Liberty City Stories- Multiplayer

Absolutely incredible. The GTA series has resorted to third-party hacks and add-ons to incorporate online play since GTA 1. In Liberty City things are already included and they are multiplayer ready. The multi-mode is a lot more pleasing than a lot of the other multiplayer PSP titles, because it actually looks like it was tweaked to fit.

It may sound odd to start with, but after playing the included 7 (…yup, 7) different type of multiplayer modes, it will be pretty clear that this is a title that will remain in the PSP library for years.

GTA: Liberty City Stories - Graphics

There are not any major graphics slowdowns, with the PSP beast doing a full conversion of the GTA 3 map (pretty much). The entire Liberty City is therefore free for roaming and provides open ended gameplay.

The camera is tricky, but can be managed if not in a heavy action sequence. Visuals are crisp, and in many cases looks like a PS2 game. Multiplayer gets a nice treatment with the graphics as well, without damaging the play too much with bad frame rates.

Graphically the game is stunning, big, with bells and whistles attached…along with some manageable slowdowns.

GTA: Liberty City Stories - Sound

The voice acting is top notch, as well as the licensed and non-licensed music. The usual funny chatter while walking the streets is there as well, profanity included. Headphones are suggested for maximum enjoyment of the audio, but if not available the PSP’s speakers will do just fine.

Licensed music is big in the series and gets the nod in this one with more wonderful commentary from the DJ’s. As silly as it may sound, the game is actually enjoyable even while just riding around and listening to the extremely versatile station lineup.

GTA: Liberty City Stories - Summing up

GTA: Liberty City Stories is a great game, although the lack of a usable save feature could destroy gameplay completely. With managed battery time the game is very enjoyable, but it will have to be balanced out with your other titles. As annoying as this and the slippery controls are, it is worth it if not only to have one of the best gaming franchises in the palm of your hands.

The multiplayer modes alone are worth the games price, for the large fan-base almost guarantees you’ll find plenty of player around. So expect extensive multiplayer support, and with that, months of fun.

GTA: Liberty City Stories - cost

GTA: Liberty City Stories retails for $43.45, at the time of this review.