More than a few weeks ago we gave you a hands-off preview outlining some key gameplay features and details for the forthcoming mobster smash, Grand Theft Auto IV. While that particular item disclosed as much information as I was privy to in my presentation, it left out one of the most significant element of this new GTA outing – hands-on.

Specifically, that was a controlled demo, however, late last week Rockstar North gave the all thumbs up to their Australian office to start letting us get down and dirty with series newcomer Niko in the robust world of modern-day Liberty City. So for a few hours yesterday, that’s exactly what I did; I ran Niko through a handful of early missions - I laid waste to goons, stole drugs, outran the cops, threw Molotov cocktails, blew up helicopters, impressed a lady, took cover, fought an old man, stole a boat, escaped the feds, drove a taxi, escorted a pot-head and ate a hot-dog. And yet, after all that, just like the last
time I saw the game, I still know I’ve barely scratched the surface of what Grand Theft Auto IV is going
to offer.

When last I was out at Rockstar Australia, we finished up the controlled demo with a mission called “Truck Hustle”. This time around, I was treated to the continuation of that mission to rekindle my understanding of the game. The truck Niko stole (which was packed with heroin) at the beginning of the Truck Hustle mission, was emptied and all the contraband inside distributed to the boots of two cars in the garage of the abandoned mansion he originally left the truck at. Niko and his Mafioso associate, Phil, arrive at the mansion for the second part of the mission where the situation was being looked after by Phil’s jogging suit-clad nephew, Frankie. Just as Niko, Phil and Frankie check out the gear in the boot, however, the feds turn up and it looks as though Frankie hasn’t been as careful as he should have been. The next step then is to get in the cars and make good Niko, Phil and Frankie’s escape; feds in tow, to boot.

What transpires next is an excellent example of the fervent nature of car chases in GTA this time around. Helicopters, cops and unmarked fed vehicles are all in hot pursuit; Frankie is driving with you, while Phil is in the car in front. Frankie immediately smashes his passenger side window and while you’re doing everything you can to escape, he's at shooting cops.

As you would expect, traffic is hectic, while the fuzz on your tail is coming in thick and fast. Stunningly, thanks to the game’s incredible engine and the overall ‘anything can happen between point A and B’ element of GTA IV, the dynamic chase can see all manner of tangent outcomes. Frankie can be killed (which doesn’t matter, as long as you and Phil survive, the mission continues), cop cars can be derailed, the number of choppers after you will vary depending on how many cops you manage to kill and so on. In this specific viewing instance I saw a spectacular derailment of a police vehicle that immediately reminded me the Blues Brothers cop chase scene. But beyond the reference, it was the absolute randomness of the incident. Nothing here is canned barring the cut-scenes; it’s all dependent on the game engine, which is anything but predictable.

The mission eventually sees you, Phil and Frankie abandoning the cars with sports bags full of H strapped over each of your shoulders (apparently if Frankie dies, you’re charged with carrying his). Remembering the characters are all motioned up with the new Euphoria tech, means running, firing and generally escaping are far more difficult to do. You’ll need to climb fences and other impediments, avoid the police (which could mean having to stop and shoot them) and all while keeping the drugs and your cohort safe. Eventually the lads make their way to another vehicle (this time a van), and more action-packed driving is required before you lose the cops and safely arrive at your safe-house destination.

While this mission sounds basic on paper (ie, escape cops, keep drugs safe, get to safe-house), the true nature of having to do this in a living, breathing city (at least by videogame standards) poses more problems than solutions. Ultimately what the second half of this mission showed me was that Grand Theft Auto IV’s main draw is its dynamic nature. Nothing is scripted and there’s always more than one way to complete a mission. In fact, if certain characters die during missions, or you decide to repeat the mission, even conversations held throughout between characters can be completely different to what you may have heard the first time.

With the “Truck Hustle” gambit over, it was time for Rockstar to finally hand me the controller (we played the game on Xbox 360 FYI). After running around for a bit, I was escorted to my first mission (chronologically some ways back from “Truck Hustle”) where I was handed a task by Niko’s cousin Roman. Roman owns a personal taxi service and so I had to jump in one of his cars and go and meet pot-head Jacob, a Rastafarian dodgy dude who needs not only a lift, but also a sharp eye and keen trigger finger.

After picking him up and driving him to his destination, he hands me a pistol with which to watch his back. It turns out he’s been double-crossed and so doesn’t trust anyone (paranoid much?). He tells you to perch yourself above the area where he’s supposed to meet his contact. This mission serves more as a tutorial on how to handle the shooting aspect of GTA IV which implements a whole new aiming system over the previous games.

Holding the left-trigger will lock-on to targets and you can switch between them with a hard press of the left analogue stick. A soft touch of the stick, however, will give you slight free-aim for shooting specific body parts (ie headshots) or for aiming at exploding barrels and the like. It’ll take a bit of getting used to, but once you’ve got the hang of it, it’s fairly intuitive and a good way to make quick work of the baddies if you’re a crack shot like me (headshots are an instant kill). Once I’d watched Jacob’s back in the alley, it was time to take care of some more business, this time from inside our car. Niko waits in another back alley with the engine running in case some shit goes down. Naturally it does, and again we're served with another tutorial, this time for shooting from inside vehicles.

Inside the car, the left bumper will smash the window allowing you to shoot while driving. Obviously it’s a pretty touchy affair, but can help out in a grind as you can shoot out tires and hapless double-crossers on the run. This portion of the mission saw me having to gun down three of Jacob’s enemies from within the car, however, the cops arrived on the scene pretty quickly and my car was blocked into the alley I had been waiting in. Thinking on my toes, I alighted from my car, jumped the police car bonnet and set out on foot. From here I now had two tasks; outrun the cops and take down my targets. I managed to do all of this on foot, and while it wasn’t the desired outcome, it stood as another great example of the game’s dynamic nature. You just don’t know what’s going to happen, but thankfully you’ve been given enough freedom and recourse within Liberty City to think outside the desired goal.

Finally, the tail-end of my Jacob missions came in the form of having to learn the duck and cover system (again, a new addition to the series). We arrived outside a house where Jacob was going to burst in through the front door. To the left of the door was a window which I was to cover. Sidling against any surface for cover is as easy as a push of the right bumper. You can then click the left analogue stick in to crouch, or if the area demands it, Niko will crouch automatically. From a covered position, you can double tap RB to switch to another wall or simply move the stick in the desired direction and hit RB once. The X button will make Niko climb or jump (depending on context) from either a cover position or in general, but the actions are a little different depending on the position (and situation) he is in. Through the window I covered my main Rastafarian man with a few well-placed headshots before I took him back to his crib to do what he does best. Mission complete.

The second portion of gameplay takes place a bit further along in the overall narrative (I actually had no real idea where I currently was in this respect, but that’s a good thing as I really didn’t want the game’s central plot ruined because of a hands-on demo). At any rate, I meet Irish thug Packie McReary (and his sister who takes a real shine to Niko). He’s a roughian with a few money-making ideas he needs Niko’s help for, the first of which (and only for my play portion of the game) is to heist a shipment of meds coming in to a dock.

This mission is initially about stealth, reconnaissance and positioning. Packie and Niko climb a warehouse rooftop to scope out the scene. From here you can figure out what the mission will entail, in this case it’ll be a fire-fight with some bad guys as well stealing a truck. How you go about it from this point is entirely up to you – Packie will cover you from the rooftop and you can stay up there with him if you like, or take his advice and get closer to the scene by climbing down out of sight. I took his advice, and below could have taken cover behind a huge shipping container, or taken out the first guy by the boat through the fence in front of me. Deciding I had a good headshot opportunity I did the latter, unleashing a hellacious attack on our position from the gang hiding in and around the deal.

When locked on to a target, the aiming reticule not only gives you a point to shoot at, but also serves to give you an idea of your target’s health status. As mentioned earlier, headshots are an instant kill, but you can aim anywhere on the body and the AI doesn’t want to die, so they’ll dive out of the way, look for their own cover or, if their attention is focused elsewhere, in this case on Packie, they’ll stop picking him and all take you on.

Having all attention on Niko and Packie, I hid behind the shipping container and made sure to take out the bad-guys hiding further off in the distance. Even with the pistol at the distance I was, a steady hand with patience can perform one-hit kills. The odd goon or two managed to remain hidden behind cover, but after some seriously intense fire-fighting, we’d taken them all down. From here we jumped in the truck to deliver it to a garage a dozen or so blocks away. The thing is, our kafuffle caused a stir and drew the attention of more unwanted guests, lucky for me a tap of LB smashed the window and with X I chose my grenades, dropping them out my newly broken window which, given we were in a slow-moving vehicle, did its own job of slowing down our pursuing goons (truth be told though, I did end up blowing myself and Packie up, but only because I kept driving like an idiot).

After this, my hands-on session was over, but certainly not forgotten. I’ve mentioned before I was never a huge fan of the previous GTA games, but the new technologies and dynamics behind GTA IV are making me want this game more and more. Euphoria belongs in a game-world as big and robust as Liberty City, while the various differences between vehicles make for an interesting ride every time. I’ve been told there are trains running throughout LC that you will be able to board (I was wondering this last visit to Rockstar but they weren’t allowed to reveal anything), however, I have yet to see this. Equally, I still haven’t managed to get my hands on a flying vehicle or anything that floats – which works with my opening statement: “I still know I’ve barely scratched the surface of what Grand Theft Auto IV is going to offer”.

As it stands though, even if you’re a veteran of the GTA games, IV is going to be something of a brand new experience, making the game’s pro[an]tagonist, the Russian Niko, a perfect extension of the player – just like him, you’re entering a strange new world. From the outset you’ll have to deal with the game’s learning curve in as much as Niko will have to learn how life works in the big, unforgiving world of Liberty City. But after only a few hours with the controller in my hands, I can tell you this is a tour you’re going to want to take.