GTA IV

[Art Blade]

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GTA IV is really great  :) :-X I just finished the main story ("revenge" as final branching decision).

Take a close look at the Sentinel XS, STD ("Sentinel Tuning Division") -- I haven't done any of Stevie's (I believe his name is) exotic car missions and it is none of Brucie's. I found that car (in dark metallic green) during the last mission before I had to chase the boat on a motorbike. After the initial car chase and before you enter that building where that bloke is hiding (before the boat/helo chase), there is a firefight and a lot of cars. Some are PMP600 and some are Sentinels. Only.. not the ones you use to see on the streets. When I realised that (and after failing the mission the first time I tried) I decided to do it again, kill enemies outside the building, and drive one of those cars to my safehouse. The map doesn't show the safehouse nor does it paint a way to the marker on the map/radar but I managed and indeed the game saved it  :-() After completion of that (darn hard) mission and after the credits had rolled, I was very  curious to see if the Sentinel STD had "survived" which it did. A few pay-and-paint jobs and I got a decent car (next to the Infernus) -- The regular Sentinel has always been my favourite car (and its big brother, the Oracle)  :)

[Binnatics]

Nice find on the sentinel. I believe I've seen the car before, but I have no idea where. It's very cool, I like the back-window sunblockers, or whatever these stripes are called. In the first GTA (first in 3rd person view) that was the model the mafia used to drive. Allways black-gray with these sunblockers on the window. Only it was more 80's style and a little more rough ;)

[Art Blade]

:)

I hear that driving a Sultan RX may cause the very rare Sentinel XS to spawn as it is in the same league of tuned cars. Never saw one before, though. It has to be very rare :)

Oh and I read about a nice trick: Stevie's cars will respawn when taken away (like, when you crash them, makes sense) until you deliver them, so you take one and park in in your safe zone, go back to the respawned one and deliver that one instead. You keep the "duplicated" car -- I will check out if it works  :)

[Binnatics]

Hahaha, all into car bussiness I hear :) That's what makes GTA so great. I remember wondering around and failing missions dozens of times to get exclusive bulletproof cars. Never checked much of that stuff in GTA IV though. The tuned cars are very nice indeed. I didn't know about stevie's car respawns but it makes sense. I think that works. But it may be also possible to order specific cars you brought in before, when you complete his list. I think that's through the phone.
I've never checked about missionrelated cars like your find in the final mission. That may indeed be a unique find. There are more of these possibilities during missions I guess. In earlier versions it was possible to steal bulletproof cars out of missions and they remained bulletproof, but I think they dissabled that possibility later on. They seem to loose that ability once the mission's over. Too bad imo.
I once stole a hippy-van. Remember these old volkswagen vans with the great sound, equal to the well known beatle? They painted it in sunny flowerpowerstyle, and if you failed the mission, you would be able to stall it in your carpark ;)

[Art Blade]

I remember them and the hippies -- I grew up in the seventies and my memories start around 1970 :-()

[Art Blade]

Actually, that made me check something from back in my youth. Hippies and 70s-lovers, here you go  :-D

Spoiler

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFpfXGifKKg

[Binnatics]

Freeky  ::)

[Art Blade]

Oh man, I do love GTA IV.

Free Roam after the main mission, still some side missions left, and friends to hang out with once in a while. Weapons, loads  of cars, helos, boats, motorcycles, and a lot of pedestrians and drivers to kill, along with the police that come after you if you did.  :-() :-X

Bond. James Bond. Errrrrr, Niko Bellic.  :-D

[smg id=3543 type=link align=center width=500 caption="GTA IV 006"]

[JRD]

Indeed the GTA games are well known for giving the player a great virtual life... you earned it bro... now enjoy it as much as you can!  >:D

Are you also playing the Episodes from Liberty City? The ballad of Gay Tony? Lost and Damned?

[Binnatics]

And don't forget the multiplayer  :-D Races, mafiaworks, coop, or just imagine a team deathmatch in the streets of algonquin with 32 joinable players: Driveby shootings, sniper spots, massive firefights... Man I've had some fun in there  ^-^
@ JRD: He has them, but careful not to overload the man! He only just began :-() :-() :-()

By the way... Helos... For a second I thought you ment Halos there... Halos in GTA, wtf??!!
But I guess you just ment egg-beaters there  ;)

[Art Blade]

helos as in helicopters  :)

For now I'm just driving around, exploring (just found a motorcycle shop) and doing some of those side jobs left. For example, I finished those email car theft jobs and those assassination missions you get over a public (land line) phone. Now I'd like that mysterious Stevie to give me jobs but haven't met (unlocked) him yet.

Later on I will play those DLC.  :)

[Binnatics]

I think you just have to call him. Didn't Brucie give you his number in your phone?

[Art Blade]

no.

[Art Blade]

I found out that I fell victim to a glitch. When the phone is on sleep mode after Brucie tells you about Stevie, the first text never gets delivered to your phone. So the garage is there but I cannot trigger the Stevie missions any more. We need to keep the phone on after the missions "A Long Way To Fall" and "Smackdown" in order to receive the first text from Stevie. :D

[Binnatics]

Too bad mate. Never hered of that glitch before. Now you'll have to start all over again!!  :D

[Art Blade]

Well, I'd have to do that if I did care about 100% and if I indeed was interested in those cars, but no if I thought all of that wasn't that important. I believe I'm of the latter type :-()

Particularly because the number of cars you can save is very small and if I crashed one of those cars they'd be gone for good, anyway. That is about the only downside to the game (and the "Stevie glitch").  >:((

[Art Blade]

Currently I'm playing The Lost and Damned DLC. Three things on the negative side to mention:

1) I hate  rock music which keeps playing in the club house and safehouse. When I get into my safehouse the first thing I do is shoot  the radios to silence >:D

2) I don't like bikes (this DLC is based on them) because the only way to get things halfway done is drive them in third person view (which I don't like). In FPS manner you can do a little cruising but once it's getting serious you really need to play TPS.

3) Graphics have noise ("mood?"), are mostly kind of pale ("mood?") and it is mostly rainy ("mood?") so, yergh.

However, generally speaking, it is interesting as I'm playing one of those rockers, the designated president of a biker gang, and the events are interwoven with the main game's story which leads to meeting Niko Bellic once in a while and other characters he used to meet. So this is part of the original story but from a different point of view.

One screenie I like (during bike races).. reminds me of FUEL  ;)

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[fragger]

Nice pic :-X

Don't tell me you're trying to land on that bitty piece of rock...

[Art Blade]

cheers  :) And no, I was on the beach and jumped off of a knoll going to land on the beach again, that rock was just in the background, to my side.  :)

LOL, just a side note: I've taken 2,000+ screenshots during GTA IV so far.  :-()

[Binnatics]

I think it is indeed "mood" there. I found it kind of fitting to the story. I like the 3rd person view, so I never had that problem with the mikes. But, speaking of Fuel, could you manage bikes there in FPS better then in GTA? How's that? I mean, driving them ain't so different right?

I can imagine you don't like TLAD too much if you're not a rocker and bikeplay lover, but I think you're really gonna enjoy TBoGD then. Totally different setting, and parallel to the main Nico Bellic story as well.

I remember most of this DLC the 100% completion mode on the main missions. That involved completing a mission without much damage taken, with at least a number of headshots, no scratches to your cars and completing the missions within a short period of time. That was SO DAMN HARD, it took me days to get past just a few missions. Then, during the last mission, I found out you could get these goals seperate from eachother. Do the mission 3 times, while first focussing on the headshots, then on damage reduction and in your last playthrough on time  :D
I had done them all in one single playthrough, which was absolutely not required  :D
Anyway, It was fun doing it, and when I finally got through I was such a damn fine shooter I could snipe with a pistol  >:D That was the good side of the story  ^-^

[fragger]

I've taken 2,000+ screenshots during GTA IV so far.  :-()

???

[Binnatics]

If you had a Nikon or Canon or whatever fancy photographer you'd crash you harddisc with what you'd make picture of in real life I guess  ^+-+

[Art Blade]

I found another glitch, this time in the DLC TLAD, apparently I can't trigger a main mission. Looks like if it has just happened the 2nd time, even, in a row. I had 12 hours wasted, got back to an early save, played 4 hours to achieve all main missions just as far as before and now I am waiting for the next mission to pop up.  :(

Regarding screenshots:

I had been far beyond 10,000 screenshots in FC2. I deleted a lot because it was a little too much, only to end up adding another 5k worth of pics  ^+-+

Generally speaking, you're not far from the truth. Taking a good pic with a camera is different from painting a pic. You do shoot several hundreds of pics and only a handful make it into a magazine or exhibition or whatever, in my case only very few make it into a post at OWG :)

Regarding bikes (and other vehicles), I always prefer FPS view unless I need to pay attention to what is happening around me which is the case in most missions of TLAD.

This is what driving in FPS view looks like and a pic of a nice looking (and performing) bike of that DLC. The bike and all of the pic clearly shows "noise" that is caused by the DLC ("mood") which is unnecessary in my opinion, I'd much rather prefer to see a clear image.

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[smg id=3547 type=link align=center width=500 caption="GTA IV TLAD 003"]

[Art Blade]

Oh, there is one more downside to that DLC: It uses the same 12 savegame slots (plus auto save) the main game does. Which means you're overriding your main game's savegames when saving within the DLC (which is what you're inevitably going to do in order to save your progress). Gah  >:(( :D

[Art Blade]

Found the solution for the DLC glitch ("was it worth it?" mission not starting) on some forum. Incredible. You're not going to believe what it is:

Jim won't send you the text telling you to meet him at Ray's unless you're good friends which means do something like play air hockey with him.  :D :D :D

Immediately after playing air hockey with him he sent me the text.  :D :D :D

Now I have wasted 4 hours rather than 12 but still. I'm lucky I made a backup of before redoing all those 4 hour missions so I can kick off from where I had left. Phew  ??? :)