Community:GTA IV Gripes/In-game World

The printable version is no longer supported and may have rendering errors. Please update your browser bookmarks and please use the default browser print function instead.



This is the official Grand Theft Wiki GTA IV Gripes list.

For now, this page is open to everybody. If there is any abuse of this page it will be locked, and all submissions will have to go through the Discussion page.

The "Gripes" on this page are intended to warn new players of things they may not like about the game.

The "Rebuts" on this page are intended to explain to new players why some gripes may not be a "gripe" for all players.

Please do not repeat other people's gripes. Also, no silly/stupid/idiotic/explicit/racist gripes or rebuttals.

How To Gripe

  • Find the appropriate sub-page for your gripe.
  • Make sure your gripe hasn't already been mentioned.
  • Start a gripe with {{Gripe}}, then follow with your gripe.

How To Rebut Gripes

  • Rebuttals to gripes should be directly underneath the gripe.
  • Start your rebuttal with :{{Rebut}}, then follow with your rebuttal.
  • Rebuttals should address reasons it is not a valid gripe, and should not accuse the gripe of being "silly" or "stupid."

Gripe RebutTime doesn't progress in the city; seasons dont change, construction sites dont wrap up and finish and no new buildings are built. I doubt NYC's construction sites work forever and never complete their task. Another hit on realism.

Gripe RebutMaybe its just me, but going near Happiness Island causes the game to noticeably lag on the island shoreline and near the docks, making boats a useless mode of transport.

Gripe RebutDespite New York City being a center for shipping and cruise lines, no cruise ships or cargo ships leave or go near Liberty City, which detracts from the realism and makes the city feel isolated.

Gripe RebutEven though Rockstar touted the game to have more interiors than SA, there are in fact less, as most of them are accessible for only one mission.

Gripe RebutThere aren't as many different clothing styles and options as there used to be, especially in San Andreas and theres very few "silly" options like mad hats and such.

RebutAt least there are some! Compare GTA IV to its predecessors, except San Andreas, in terms of customizing your pro/antagonist. Also, GTA isn't exactly a 'silly' game.
Gripe

RebutActually GTA was always a silly and unrealistic series, and that was what made it fun. Flying airplanes despite having no training, wielding miniguns, surviving car crashes...that was the best part of GTA, and GTA IV just removes all that. Its a bold step, but I guarantee GTA IV would be a lot more fun if the police were a lot stupider, unrealistic weapons were brought back and the physics were toned down a lot.

Gripe RebutThe Coney Island Theme Park is unusable, and there are no theme parks elsewhere in the city.

Gripe RebutThe airplanes at Francis International Airport are stuck in an eternal taxiing loop: they never take off, and no planes ever land, which detracts heavily from the purported realism of the game. They're invincible also, which is annoying and detracts even more from realism. There.

Gripe RebutThe airport in GTAIV is unrealistic. Only Boeing 747s? I very highly doubt a major airport like JFK, which Francis International ingame is based off, is only serviced by 747s.

Gripe RebutThere are only 2 comedians in the comedy clubs, and their material is bland and unfunny.

Gripe

RebutA -5 for realism for only 2 comedy shows. It should've have more shows and humor, but only 2 for a huge Liberty City? Now that's unrealistic.

RebutYes, I agree it would have been better to have more comedians, but there are much more than 2 comedy shows. Each comedian has around four shows each. And I thought they were really funny. Perestroika's shows are pretty funny too!
Gripe

RebutTrue, but Ricky Gervais's and Katt Williams' material is unfunny and doesn't seem to fit. I walked into Split Sides (where Gervais performed) and walked out 15 seconds into his act on how horrible it was.

RebutThere is no way to have comedians that everyone would like. Stand-up comedians, any of them, are liked by some and hated by some. To me, at least, it seemed that their material fit very well with the type of humor that is always infused into GTA games.
Gripe

RebutI have never seen comedians with such bad material though. I mean, GTA's focus, I though was to provide a Sand-box game with many funny features but this is just a down-step.

Gripe RebutNo random games like the off track betting, Pogo the monkey or other arcade games save from Qub3d.

RebutNo, but the player can play pool or darts, or go bowling. New games for a new game.
Gripe

RebutTrue, but I prefer arcade games. They're much better than doing bowling or darts.

RebutPlay QUB3D
Gripe

RebutI'd rather play Duality, Go Go Space Monkey, and They Crawled from Uranus from GTA San Andreas, rather than just one arcade game that Rockstar Games totally ruined it.

Gripe

RebutThe amount of "random games" was substantially reduced. This affects realism, in terms of the player being able to interact with the city and the longevity, with yet another 5 or 6 sources of amusement the game doesn't have.

Gripe RebutPlaying pool is realistic, but should have been able to make a friendly wager, between friends, nothing there to do that, as well as darts

Gripe RebutThere are only 3 unique Clothing stores in the game.

Gripe

RebutIt should've have at least 50 clothing shops or more, but only 3 ona huge Liberty City? Badly affects realistic attempts.

Gripe RebutGiven that a generic interior could be created, there's too few stores and the like to wander into compared to San Andreas (Cluckin' Bell outlets as just a facade with no way in).

RebutBut do you remember those loading times when you enter almost every interior buildings? GTA IV has non except for when you are on a mission where there would be a cutscene after you enter it.
{{Gripe

RebutOnce again, this lacks realistic attempts to this game. In real life, you would have huge range of restaurants, clothing shops, comedy shows, bowling alleys, arcades, etc. The game, however, has few and makes no sense why.

Gripe RebutThe trees are invincible.

Gripe RebutWell Stacked Pizza is missing.

RebutBut you can eat at restaurants and off the street.
Gripe

RebutIn real life, you would have a range of restaurants, whereas in this game only has two. This game strays away realism from it's real life counterpart.

RebutBut Rock* spent more time improving the exterior, giving great sniping points, stunt jumps, etc plus you have no hunger meter like in GTA:SA which prevents you from passing out, losing money, or wasting time.

Gripe RebutMilitary base is completely gone.

RebutYes but i dont think there would be a military base in the middle of the city.
RebutThere's no military base in New York City, and Fort Dix is a good distance away from Jersey City.
Gripe

RebutBut as you said this isn't new york city, san andreas had the Military and it was based on las vegas,Nv San francisco,ca and Los Angeles,Ca

Gripe RebutProLaps are seen at the Starlight District, but is no longer accessible. Didier Sachs may be seen at the same location, but is also inaccessible, including Binco.

Gripe RebutYou can't go underwater to see fishes, dolphins, turtles, even sharks.

RebutWould you want to swim under all that poisonous dirty water in NYC?
Gripe

RebutIt looks ridiculous when Niko jumps 20 meters from a bridge only to land on the surface of the water.

Gripe RebutThe two largest, widest straightaways in Alqonquin are both under construction, leaving no place to really go fast.

RebutHighway, and why not use the straight just right in front of your safehouse in Algonquin. It's REALLY long and filled with cars and two jumps. Very entertaining and useful to train your driving skills.
Gripe

RebutIt's not really safe to go really fast on straightaways. Traffics will change lanes quickly without even seeing you, making the Highways useless even more when confronted by slow moving traffics.

Gripe RebutThe two widest ones going north-south on each side of Middle Park are the best to go fast, but they end with a construction site about halfway, which is annoying.

Rebut Welcome to a city modeled off of New York, one of the world's most unfriendly cities towards traffic.
Gripe

RebutThe construction should progress and finish up, reopening the streets, but it doesn't. Another -1 for realism in GTAIV.

Gripe RebutSome areas, like restaurants, aren't denoted on the radar, despite working and accessible, i.e. the Burger Shots in Beechwood City, Westdyke and Northwood.

Gripe RebutAlderney doesn't have any food stores and barely any places of interest, making it a useless area to visit.

RebutStrip Club, stunt jumps, pigeons, random peds.
Gripe

RebutIt's still a useless area to visit. Besides, there are'nt any places of interest and there were'nt any shows, bars, restaurants, or even bowling alleys.

Rebut There's a chopper for the taking by the tunnel entrance that's worth a visit.
Gripe

RebutStill very useless to visit, even with the chopper. What's more important that it must feature all accessible buildings, yet strays away realism of all building interiors.

Gripe RebutThe Bars is inaccessible because you have to be accompanied by a friend.

Gripe RebutRockstar changed the name of the islands(i.e. Staunton and Portland's name are changed).

RebutTrue the names are changed, But no city would enjoy having it's name in a blow up, cop killing game. Since the September 11th terrorist attacks on New York it would be bad taste to have Niko a soviet immigrant cause hell and kill New York cops.
Gripe

RebutBut in-reality, why would a city just change a whole lot of districts names with-in 7 years. It ruins the game a bit and it's history

RebutIt didn't change its name, it has always been that in Liberty City. It is BASED off of New York, it isn't actually New York. With names changed Rockstar can make it resemble NY, but also shake things up.

Gripe RebutThe Alderney safehouse is crappy and run-down, a downgrade even though the Algonquin safehouses are luxurious and much bigger.

RebutIt's just a safehouse that is given to you by Ray, not particular a good one. Especially Ray is not THAT rich. Do you know how your big safehouses came from? Roman, that rich guy after escaping and even changed his taxi to cavalcades. Playboy X, rich and bling.
RebutAlderney is modeled off of New Jersey, so you can't expect much.
Gripe

RebutBut Alderney has rich houses and lets you store cars in the garage. A -3 for having the last and crappy safehouse, instead of a rich and famous house.

Gripe RebutPegorino's house had the potential to become your safehouse once he died. Once the game ends...nothing. It sits there, unoccupied, the garage fully functional. A -5 for realism R*.

Gripe RebutGrand Central Terminal isn't accessible, despite being in the game. A bad move, as its interior is large and would be interesting to explore.

Gripe RebutZIP clothing shop is gone.

Gripe RebutIn a game where money is useless you would think you could use some of that 1,000,000 dollars you make to upgrade the crappy apartments, buy a garage in the alley, add internet, add a big screen tv, pay rent, etc.

Gripe

RebutEspecially when the character's primary motivation is money.

Gripe

RebutI know, right? I've made 50k and Roman's still whining about people coming after him for money. Why don't I have the option to just pay those people off?

Gripe RebutAlderney City has no darn train stations, I thought that New Jersey was full of sub-ways.

RebutIt is not EXACTLY ripped off from New Jersey or wherever it originated from.
Gripe

RebutBut I mean in a highly congested city, at least I thought that there should be some sought of rail link to the industrial city.

Gripe

RebutJersey City has MTA Metrorail, subways, elevated rail, the works. Why these aren't in Alderney?

Gripe RebutATM machines are completely useless and now way of using it. You can only check out balance and not take out money by either destroying it (which dispenses a lot of money) or even use fast cash to earn more cash.

Gripe

RebutThe HUD even shows how much money you have, so yeah, whats the point of ATM machines?

RebutATM's are handy for making money. What you do is kill other people using the ATM's.
Gripe

RebutBut what's the use of ATM machines? You can just simply check out balance and not take out money by making fast cash or even destroying it. It does nothing. No offense, but the ATM machines are a pointless feature to the GTA series.

Gripe RebutSevere weather conditions isn't featured (snow, blizzard, flash floods, tropical storm, etc.)

Gripe

RebutEspecially since it was rumored the seasons would change in-game. Its always autumn in the game.

Gripe RebutConsidering how Rockstar Games put a lot of good well known songs on the radio in both GTA Vice City and San Andreas (as well as having the Scarface soundtrack in GTA III), I was surprised and disappointed to find out that GTA IV's soundtrack is mostly made up of unknown artists (granted, there are several big name artists but, hardly any compared to previous games) and completely fails to reflect popular music of the current decade, in my opinion. However, the parodies of the war on terror, internet, movies etc on the radio do reflect the decade well.

RebutListen to an ipod or MP3.
Gripe

RebutI wish R* would let you add custom soundtracks into the game, much like listening to your own music in the car, yet detracts realism to the game because they somehow forgot to add this feature.

Gripe RebutThe radio talk shows loop too quickly, and there's less overall material than in previous GTAs. Almost as if it was unfinished.

Gripe RebutThe city is grossly under populated. Go to Star Junction at 9pm on a Friday Night and it is deserted. 5pm on a Friday, there is some traffic, but for what it is supposed to be it just falls short again. There are more peds behind the flats in Northwood than in Star Junction. The report that Rockstar modeled the traffic on NYC is pure garbage. Living breathing city....not even close.

Gripe

RebutEspecially since Times Square is supposed to have hundreds of thousands of people and cars traveling through it at any given time. The game can handle more than 5 peds on screen, so why R* did what they did is a mystery.

Gripe RebutThe moving lights that appear on the streets at night while up in the air (probably to simulate traffic and save memory) are poorly plotted. They go in the wrong direction on the street, go diagonally and do weird things, making the feeling of a heavily populated city vanish.

Gripe RebutR* says that "you can finish the game without a single loading screen". It turns out that R* was lying, because there are loading times hen accessing into missions or multiplayers, entering safehouses, etc.

Gripe RebutVery few (if any) fire escapes touch the ground. They can't even be reached by jumping.

Gripe RebutThe flying rats(pigeons)were a really stupid idea, going around and killing 200 of them or even one, Rock Star should have made more missions, not something this stupid.I mean, who would really go and kill animals or birds in real life in new york or whereever, just lame

Gripe RebutTV shows are a useless feature, because there is are only 2 channels and it's pointless how. Almost all other shows are repetitive and their humor is weak and unfunny, if it repeats.

Gripe RebutOnly 1 car commerical into the television while there are all other cars that needs to be broadcasted into the commercial, but it's a worthless commercial.

Gripe RebutThe Las Venturas Poker Challenge is a pointless competition. No one knows who won, so it's a lame competition.

Gripe RebutAnother thing, It would have been nice to see some of the places from the previous games in liberty city, sal's home, joey's garage, saint marks bistro, so far i have not seen any of those places, run down or otherwise

Gripe RebutNew York City is like the fashion capital of the U.S. How come there arent any shopping malls or a larger variety of clothing shops?