You down with DLC? Yeah, you know me. Or, at least you will on Feb. 17.
Grand Theft Auto IV took the gaming industry by storm last year, raking in more than $500 million in its first week on store shelves. With nothing better to do outside of flying around in their golden helicopters, Rockstar Games went to work on some new material, affectionately known as "expansion packs" and "downloadable content" within gaming circles. But, if there's anything
GTA developers want people to know about their upcoming add-on, it's that you're not just going to be getting a cool new weapon or some clothes to make your game avatar look different. In many ways, you're getting a different game altogether. Move over
Niko Bellic, easy rider
Johnny Klebitz is making the rounds. (Not too far over, though; you're still cool.)
Background — "Johnny Be Good."Those familiar with
GTA IV's plot remember a protagonist, Niko, whose knowledge of
Liberty City was as limited as his broken English. Fresh off the boat and in search of revenge, Niko was forced to become a taxi driver for a good third of the story, frustrating veterans of the series who were used to blowing things up and taking down crime empires. The explosions and excitement would soon come, but they would be the product of dealings with some of Liberty City's sketchiest slime.
Enter
Johnny Klebitz, Vice President of the motorcycle gang, The Lost. Acting as the leader while Billy, the gang's president, serves out a stint in rehab, Johnny has refocused the group's motivations from violently marking territory to profiteering. When Billy returns to reclaim leadership, Johnny has to walk a tightrope of tempering relations with his ruckus-minded partner and helping the gang fend off assaults from the rival gang, Angels of Death.
"This is my rifle. There are many like it but this one is mine. My rifle is my best friend."
Demo Walkthrough — "This Is the Good Stuff."
GraphicsThe first thing you'll notice in Johnny's Liberty City is that the graphics have been changed. Rockstar has inserted a little bit of noise into the interface, giving the game a bit of a "dirtier" feel, paralleling the grimier lifestyle Johnny leads as a member of a motorcycle gang. In that sense, the visual trick is effective and puts you in a different frame of mind.
GunsIn terms of arsenal, there are five new weapons to play with this time around: an automatic 9mm (shoots 10 bullets in a short time span), a smoke-spewing
sawed-off shotgun, an absolutely devastating
assault shotgun, a
pipe bomb, and a
grenade launcher. Some missions require you to use one over the others: One called "Shifting Weight" tasked me to fend off hordes of helicopters and cop cars with the assault shotgun while hanging off the back of a bike.
RidesWhile there are a plethora of new vehicles for you to jack, there is an obvious focus on motorcycles. Johnny, as a proficient bike rider, is generally more agile when on a hog and is harder to send flying through the air, unlike Niko who felt the need to eat curb whenever the bike so much as went two inches off the ground. You'll be riding a
custom-made motorcycle, which can not be magically recovered if destroyed. (We recommend weekly oil changes and avoiding stray rocket-propelled grenades.)
MissionsWe played through three of the missions available in the expansion pack—
"Action/Reaction," "Buyer's Market," and
"Shifting Weight." We preferred "Shifting Weight" by far, as it provided the most action and explosions, but of note in the others are the intersecting Niko/Johnny storylines. "Buyer's Market" is a mission from the original
GTA IV storyline, but from the perspective of Johnny, who has to make a run from the cops separately from Niko and his hired help after a drug bust.
The Lost and Damned plot is both tangential from and grounded within the framework of the original's plot.
MultiplayerWe weren't shown anything, but we were at least given a morsel to munch on until the DLC's release: There will be new multiplayer modes—both team-based and solo. Huzzah!
Preview Verdict — "We're Neither Lost Nor Damned. Impressed? Maybe"
While you are essentially redoing some of the same missions over again from the original, Johnny Klebitz is a smart pick by Rockstar to bring back players within the limits of Liberty City. We admittedly haven't visited in months, what with all of the other games taking up valuable sleeping time, but from what we played,
20 dollars doesn't seem too steep of an investment to make into something that will be anywhere from 10 to 20 hours of additional gameplay. With just enough new firepower at our disposal and new places to explore, we can't wait to return back to town and be the architect of some more mayhem.
GTA IV: The Lost and Damned will be available Feb. 17 exclusively on Xbox 360 for $19.99.
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