Grand Theft Auto is coming to DS and it's looking awesome. But that's not all you need to know about Rockstar Leeds' epic new iteration of the most controversial series in gaming history.
Since its surprise announcement last year, we've wondered exactly how on earth you could fit Grand Theft Auto's vibrant world of guns and gangsters onto the DS without making some serious compromises. We feared a repeat of the disappointing Grand Theft Auto Advance we saw four years ago on the GBA, but one hands-on session with Chinatown Wars has changed all that. No doubt you'll have a lot of questions about the game - so we're going to answer them for you.
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What's The Story? You are Huang Lee, a young member of the Chinese Triad Crime syndicate on his way to Liberty City after the assassination of your father in Hong Kong. Huang is on his way to meet Uncle Wu 'Kenny' Lee and deliver the Yu Jian sword. What his uncle doesn't know is that while the word is revered, it was actually won by Lee's father in a card game. So in actual fact, your in-game father was a bit of a cad - drink, drugs and women were more his thing.
So despite your father's misdemeanours, you're on a mission to solve the mystery behind your father's death, partly out of a sense of justice but also because it'll ensure you get a big chunk of cash from your recently deceased Dad.
Of course, upon landing at Francis International Airport, you get ambushed and end up frantically trying to escape a car that has been driven into a river. Punching the window out with the touch screen sets you free, and you can begin your quest to find would-be assassins.
How Does It Work On DS? As you can see from the screens on these pages, it's a top-down interpretation of Grand Theft Auto that will be familiar to anyone that has played the pre-3D GTAs of old. But that's not to say it's a step backwards for the series - this is still very much a fully-blown Grand Theft Auto game and it squeezes every last drop of graphical oomph out of the humble DS. Cruising around the streets of Liberty City is much more impressive than the screens on these pages might at first suggest - the action moves fast and the in-game and cut scene art style really works. On foot, you can lock on to targets and switch between them quite simply, and the gunfights are frantic - Rockstar hasn't held back when it comes to the weapons available and the sheer number of people on screen at one time is extremely impressive.
How Is The Touch Screen Used? Alongside the usual map and weapon selection, your PDA is used to communicate with the other in-game characters and take on the various missions, but most intriguing are the context-sensitive mini-games that regularly pop up. In the time we spent with Chinatown Wars, we assembled a sniper rifle, cracked a safe and rummaged through a skip with the touch screen - and it all worked really well. These interludes are not the tacked-on mini-games that we've seen so often and they genuinely add to the experience rather than get in the way. Chucking grenades and Molotov cocktails around is also down to the flick of a wrist on the bottom screen. In one mission we administered some fiery justice from a helicopter with infinite Molotov cocktails at our disposal. Also, there's a nice touch with the mic - you can whistle for a cab if the mood takes you.
Is It Really A 'Proper' GTA Game? A thousand times yes. Right from the impressive intro sequence the tone is set - there's lots of swearing, the cut scenes are bursting with character and once you get to play the game itself, it's genuinely surprising just how much Rockstar Leeds has managed to cram into Chinatown Wars. There really are no half measures here.
On first impressions, the missions are as varied and imaginative as ever, and the side missions are plentiful. In particular, the drug dealing element - controversial as it may be - has enough depth to be treated as more than a mere side quest. Obviously this is a game for adults, so younger gamers should be steering well clear, but from what we saw it offers empire-building potential as you ferry your contraband across Liberty City, buying and selling to turn as big a profit as possible.
How Big Is It? Huge. For those familiar with the series, the map is based upon the Liberty City of GTA IV, with only one of the four boroughs - Alderney - missing. To have squeezed all this into one DS cart is quite an achievement in itself, so add in all the missions, cut scenes, weapons, mini-games and side quests and you've got an impressive package. The team at Rockstar Leeds have previous form here - they crammed GTA: Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories onto PSP and have done a similarly impressive job here.
There's a full day/night cycle, dynamic weather, the usual in-car radio stations and there's an autosave function when you close your DS. Rockstar Leeds has performed a minor miracle in terms of cramming in the extras and quirks that make GTA games really stand out from the crowd.
Will It Be Any Good? It's looking very promising indeed. The driving is fast-paced and fun, the on-foot combat is chaotic and overblown, and as long as Rockstar maintain the same sense of mission variety that it is famed for, then we're onto a winner here. Chinatown Wars could be an absolutely massive title for the DS in 2009. Roll on 20 March...
