Seems I was a bit wrong in my stats last time. I was 50% complete at 8 hours. However, I was pretty close to completing the story, with only a handful of missions available. Still, it took me over 12 hours in total before I completed it.
Thankfully, the ending mission was more lighthearted and less back-stabby than both Nico and Jonny’s plotlines. Even if it did turn out to be utterly ridiculous. Fun though.
I’d previously been playing Perfect Dark Zero on my 360, when, after about 6 levels I thought – “Why the hell am I playing this?”. It was rubbish. And I had a billion other better things to play, like this already downloaded ages ago DLC for GTA IV.
Whereas the main story was all over the place, but mainly involved Russians, and The Lost and Damned was all bikers and backstabbing, Gay Tony is overblown silliness involving nightclubs and helicopters and diamonds and helicopters and basejumping AND HELICOPTERS. Lots of helicopters. ENOUGH WITH THE HELICOPTERS ALREADY.
Seriously. 5 missions in a row were helicopter based.
Not that I dislike helicopters, but I don’t want half the game to take place in the sky.
Anyway. The silliness is funny. As always, the characters are great, the acting is amazing, and the story is gripping. If silly. And Yusef Amir is outstanding.
I think, according to the stats, I’m around 60% through now. Past experience says that the end is just around the corner (as 70%-ish complete is normally “story done” in GTA games). Which is a shame as it seems short. Mind you, TLaD only took about 8 hours to do, so it’s on par with that.
I’ve just completed this. And it was aces. The story was a proper GTA story, the missions were proper GTA missions, and the feel was proper GTA.
It was probably easier than most previous games in the series, but that wasn’t a problem. It was just GTA in your hand, and that’s excellent.
Erm, right. That was a bit short, wasn’t it? Yeah, so I have 11 of the 12 races left, and some of the gang warfare stuff, but I’ve done everything else. And it took me about 8 hours.
I’m sure I read somewhere that The Lost and Damned expansion was supposed to provide “around 35 hours” extra gameplay. If so, I’d love to know where it was.
Not that it really matters as I enjoyed it all anyway. At first I wasn’t sure, but I soon got sucked into the story and really liked all the crossover stuff with Nico. The final mission was the easiest mission in GTA history, though, so was a little disappointing. Every other GTA finale has been stupidly hard requiring $hlmun retries, but not this time. Again though, it didn’t really matter.
More DLC on the way, Rockstar?
I started playing this a bit before the weekend, then played it again for a couple of hours again today. So far, I’ve been enjoying it, but it isn’t quite working for me yet.
There’s nothing wrong with it, as such, it’s just not as much fun as “proper” GTA IV was. Johnny is, in appearance at least, a carbon copy of Nico, and all his biker chums appear to be the same and I don’t remember who is who. Also, as much as I love bikes in GTA games, they’re mainly fun for mucking around in. This storyline is bike-heavy for missions – and they’re rubbish handling Harley-like bikes too. I much prefer a nice car for most missions, really.
But as I said, there’s nothing actually wrong. I’m liking the tie-ins with the original storyline (you even redo a mission that Nico did – with Nico) and seeing some of the characters from another angle.
I’m not, however, enjoying the full-frontal nudity of Stubbs. GTA has gone too far!
Well, that’s all the cars nicked for Stevie – all 30 of them. One was a little tricky as it was parking in a police station car park – next to a policeman. Managed to escape having shot the cop before stealing the car though.
And then it was on to races for Brucie. Could I find a decent car anywhere though? No . So I turned up in this rubbish Mondeo-alike only to find a starting lineup of Infernuses. So I tried “cheating” by blowing the cars up as we pulled away from the line. Sadly, that abandons the race. As does popping the tyres before the flag goes up. And killing the drivers. Luckily, even in Infernuses, they drive as slow as you – so I beat them in the end without resorting to anything less sportsmanlike. Tch, eh?
First up this evening was nicking more cars for Stevie. One of them was a real pain to find – it said it was next to the Liberty Transport Authority building on Rotterdam Hill, but it was actually miles away. I spent a good 45 minutes trying to find it. Anyway, I’ve nicked 20 cars for him now.
Then I played online for a few games, mainly in Ranked Team Deathmatch. I was disappointed not to get the achievement for killing at least 5 people from other teams, even though I killed 19 (and yes, there were at least five different people that I killed – I managed to rocket-kill 9 of them in one shot!).
I’m starting to run out of things to do now, which is a shame. Having said that, I’m not going to milk it for all it’s achievement points, because some of them simply aren’t fun and will spoil my memory of the game.
I finished off nicking all of the cars Brucie wanted (it turned out my email inbox was full, so wasn’t getting emails from him), which took most of today’s play. I went on some heli tours – lots of them, in fact, but didn’t get the achievement for them all. I don’t know how you’re supposed to know when you’ve done them all – I’ve been in all three helicopters from all six helipads, but nothing.
Dwayne’s special “power” GET! Jacob’s special “power” GET! And, thanks to finally getting hold of Brucie and taking him out loads of times, Brucie’s “power” GET!
But I still can’t nick cars for Brucie, even though his like for me is now 94%.
GTA Glitch Watch
Aside from Brucie’s not-sending-me-emails bug, the game stops working every time I try to got for a heli ride with him. I call him up for one, drive to his house, and the game “takes over”, I get out the car, and him and two women walk up to me. He says something about “taking the bitches for a spin the chopper” and nothing happens. The game continues to play out – cars go past, Niko shuffles on the spot, people walk by, but nothing else. I can’t walk anywhere, no cut scenes, we don’t get in the helicopter, and no-one says or does anything. I can’t move the camera either – just like the bug earlier in the game when the same thing happened at a burger stand near Firefly Island. Hmm.
I’m trying to build up relationships with all my in-game friends at the moment. Packie and Jacob in particular, as their like for me are both very low. Spent most of today’s play doing that, but also nicked another couple of cars for Stevie. No emails from Brucie though about nicking more cars for him, although he only likes me 35% so that might be it…
Yeah so anyway. It’s complete but there’s still stuff to do! By day, I’m friend-to-all, taking my chums out for meals and drinks and games, and by night I’m nicking cars for Brucie and Stevie. It’s an ace double life!
Only Brucie isn’t sending me emails with requests for cars any more. I think it’s because his like for me is only 35%, but I can’t increase it as he never answers the phone! Pff.
What percentage do you have to get your friends at to trigger their special ability anyway?
At 57 hours game time, and on my third attempt, I completed the final mission and killed Dimitri. Game over! And around 20 minutes of credits too – they even name the office receptionist…
But I wasn’t happy with the outcome. Someone dies, and I didn’t like it. So I went back to a previous save and chose to kill Dimitri then rather than work with him. The result? Another death. A different death, sure, but one that was a bit easier to take in, even though I still didn’t like it. Then the “new” final mission, which was much like the other one to begin with, but with a different chase sequence and a different “boss” – who was much easier to kill once he was on foot.
And then the end again.
I decided to “keep” this ending, and carry on playing from it rather than return to the other one. I then spent ages taking friends out eating, drinking, going to see shows, going to strip clubs and playing darts. It’s going to be a long process getting them all up to 100% though – most are still less than 40% even after the wining and dining.
It didn’t help that I simply can’t do Jacob’s package deliveries, and his Like for me drops every time I fail.
Played mainly online today. Started off with a bit of Free Play, then Deathmatched for a game or to, before finishing off the session with several rounds of Mafiya Work. The latter of which was actually better than I was expecting, but seemed far too random to require much skill – whoever was nearest the target when it appeared tended to “win”.
After that, I was kicked off Live for some reason, so played offline for a bit. I attempted the final mission – going after Dimitri – and failed when he blew up my boat with a rocket. And it takes aaaaages to get back to that point. Grr!
So I tooled up and retried the mission, completing it without any problems this time. After which it was time for Roman’s wedding – a wedding which I was told was going to take place at 10am. I hung around a safe house, shopped for a new suit, and went for a walk while waiting. But the game never told me where to actually go. Come 1pm, I decided to save my game, and then immediately afterwards got a call from Roman asking where the hell I was. Bizarre! (GTA Glitch Watch?)
Anyway, the wedding happened and then a nasty spoiler. A nasty spoiler which didn’t sit well with me and I didn’t like at all. So much so, I’m going to go back to an earlier save and kill Dimitri.
I think I’m almost done! I went back to the main story, and found Darko Brevic – who I decided not to kill. I don’t know if that was the right decision or not, but since I’ve saved everyone I could so far, and Roman was quite insistent I spare him, I thought it best.
And then I attempted what I assume is the final mission. I was given the choice of working with Dimitri, or killing him. I chose to work with him, but as expected, he double-crossed me. And I died trying to finish the mission. Pff.
Just vigilante missions again today, and completed them all. Which netted me another achievement! Some of them were pretty good too – far better and more varied than the usual stuff from previous games in the series.
I then played online for a while, on Ranked Deathmatch. Picked up another two achievements there as well, even though I didn’t do especially well.
Just Vigilante missions again today. I’ve finished all the Most Wanted missions in the Bohan/Broker areas, and completed two in Alderney too.
I’m also over 51 hours in now. And I’ve still not completed it. It’s also just about the only game I’ve played for almost two weeks now too. Yes, it is very good.
Mainly spent my time on vigilante missions today, getting the achievement for taking down 20 criminals found on the police computer, and then completing all the Algonquin “Most Wanted” missions.
After that I did Gravelli’s (or whatever his name is – old bloke in the hospital) next mission – blowing up some vans filled with cocaine. I took an indirect route around some rooftops, which made it much easier than it originally looked. Then I retried Phil’s mission getting some drugs from a boatyard. Found that much easier than last time, completing it easily.
Finally, I took Kate out on a date. It didn’t go well, as to start with I turned up just one minute late, then se complained about my clothes, my bike riding skillz (she didn’t like being on an NRG 900 for some reason) and then when we arrived at the bowling place it wouldn’t let us start a game, so we left and I accidentally threw her from the bike when I clipped a kerb. So she went home on her own. Smooth, Niko, really smooth.
GTA Glitch Watch
Glitches in abundance today! Lots and lots of objects popping in after I’ve hit them, and the tunnel from Alderney to Algonquin was completely black for a good 1/3 of its length before any of it was drawn in.
One of my cars parked outside my East Holland safehouse vanished too – even though it was in the designated parking, and, in fact, had been there for around 20-odd hours play at least.
Then there was the problem with Kate’s date. I got to the bowling place but it wouldn’t let me play. No idea why – and no, she hadn’t requested a particular sort of date (in fact I rang her) and when I’d picked her up it was shown on my map as a “valid” place to do. Very odd.
Quite a lot of play on this again today. I’m past 48 hours on it now. That’s a lot more than any of the other GTA games, despite the fact this has a smaller map than San Andreas. Or does it? It might actually be larger – just being more filled in makes it seem smaller…
Anyway. I broke the $500,000 “barrier” today, mainly by nicking cars for Brucie and Stevie. And not a lot else, actually. Silly me hadn’t realised that the box the game comes in includes a map of Liberty City, complete with street names, so I could have saved myself a lot of aimless driving around for Stevie…
First off today I did my first Assassin mission, followed by the rest of them in quick succession. They were all pretty easy, and doing all nine netted me an achievement. I then did a couple of missions for Jimmy, and found a guy on the street I’d met in the game previously and did a “side-mission” with him. Or rather, shot him.
Then I stole some cars (and bikes) for Brucie, took Little Jacob and Dwayne out for meals, and then did another mission for Jimmy. And attempted one for Phil but it was too hard.
Finally, I went to see Mr. Gravelli in the hospital, and did a couple of missions for him – including killing a Korean money counterfeiter – the same guy I helped into the country earlier in the game, it seems. Oh well.
I’m trying to get my cash up to the half-million mark. I’m on $440,000-ish at the moment.
Mainly missions for Ray (one of which went horribly wrong – for him at least) and then a mission for Ray’s friend Phil. After those, I spent ages messing around with jumps near the Acter industrial yards, and took Little Jacob and Roman out drinking and eating.
41 and a half hours in, it says. Blimey.
Aside from one mission for Bernie (chasing Russians on a boat), today’s play was spent almost entirely trying to replicate this.
It took ages to find the swings from the video, and although I found other swings elsewhere, I couldn’t make my car to anything on them. Finally found the set shown, and had a merry time glitching cars into oblivion.
I didn’t get anything amazing out of it – certainly no huge launches like the video – but I did get some impressive spinning cars and fantastically damaged vehicles.
GTA Glitch Watch? I think that was the point today, wasn’t it?
Tada! I scanned some covers in 
As for today’s play… I found Bernie, killed some people for him, did a few more jobs for Ray, and spent ages trying to get the achievement for blowing up 10 vehicles in 10 seconds. In the end, my wife’s suggestion of blocking up a tunnel and filling it with cars was the winner, as not only was it easy to get the cars piled up, but the police didn’t see what I was doing and spoil the party.
GTA Glitch Watch
A few things today. First up was when I was driving a bike down the pedestrian part of (I think) the Broker Bridge. I hit a lamp post and was thrown off the bike. I got back on the bike, but my body was wedged inside a bridge support strut, and I couldn’t move. I got off the bike, but the bike then got flung a few metres away as if it had been on elastic.
I was driving a car I’d just nicked around Alderney, and took a staggered junction badly, resulting in me driving head-first into a tree – albeit very slowly (I’d managed to brake almost in time). I reversed away from the tree, round a corner, and bumped into a wall. Then, as I was just pulling away, my car exploded, killing me. I didn’t have any police after me, the road was deserted, and aside from a slightly dented front bumper, my car was in perfect condition. Bizarre.
Didn’t complete any more missions this go, but did take Roman, Little Jacob and Carmen all out. I then nicked the helicopter from near my Alderney house and flew under all the bridges to get the associated achievement.
Played this loads today. Too much to go into everything, though.
Completed another couple of missions for Packie, some for Ray, and some for Gerry and whatever the other Irish brother is. Then I had another choice of two people to kill, and so chose the one I hated the most (who probably deserved it) then went to his funeral. WHich seemed a bit wrong.
Anyway, I then kidnapped some mob daughter, and found some more jumps.
