Disappointed

[Neil]

The thing I most wanted to try out in this game was the multiplayer mode. I bought the game and the first thing I did was go straight into the MP mode as soon as I could. I joined a GTA Race first, and I soon found out about the crazy car handling. This I can live with - I play so many driving games that adjusting to a new one is not a problem for me.

However, where I have serious gripe is with the shooting mechanics. These are clearly designed for a single player game, where you're spending your time picking off AI drone after AI drone. They are NOT suited to a multiplayer match. It really is pot luck as to how you do in the game - if you spawn near a good weapon, you've got a chance. If you spot a guy before he spots you, you've got a chance. However, if it's two guys in a shootout, it really is just completely random who wins.

I've really not tried many of the objective-based modes because the one time I did the others on my team had no clue what they were doing. I'd imagine this would be best with friends, but as mine are all currently racing through the single player or completing coursework, it'll have to wait.

Does anyone else feel disappointed by the MP in this game?

[yimpat]

havent played mp yet.But i cant even really get to grips wif shootin on single player tbh.I found that auto lock on seemed to lock onto a random body part and i had trouble movin the to where i wanted it.Im using manual aim now but problem is i cant run while doin this only stride...

[Retromoe]

Yeah the MP isnt really thought it would be, but its just came out, gotta give it some more time to lighten up.

[randomhero]

i cant even connect to MP...

[bennifer3000]

Neil you post too much. You probably should go have a smoke break. :smoke:

[Neil]

Yeah the MP isnt really thought it would be, but its just came out, gotta give it some more time to lighten up.

Yeah, you're right and I definitely will be giving it a lot more time. However, the two games I play most online, Project Gotham Racing 4 and Call of Duty 4, both impressed me within minutes of starting them up. I've had countless moments where my heart has been racing playing both of these games, but nothing GTA IV's multiplayer has thrown up has had this effect on me.

[basic865]

It's not really that bad.

You can turn Auto-Aim off, and I have noticed that if your running while your shooting your bullets are going to stray the way that you are running... so It does kinda have to deal with skill

[David Banner]

i have yet to try mp

[Ash_735]

I like it, once I got the hang of it Deathmatch became a breeze for me, I had a 12 kill streak, yes when you have a powerful gun it's a shit load of easier, if someone has the shotgun and gets near you, you're pretty much dead, however I've found sticking with rifles and moving a lot whilst locking on works great and croutching when you have the pistol stops you from absorbing bullets like a goon.

[Shadow Conception]

How's it compare to SA-MP? Besides the whole 100-player/16-player thing...

[Ash_735]

Synched :P, Shooting people actually takes health off, not noticed any lag at all or people jumping around, then again I suppose we have to wait for the sad bastards to hack the game before we start getting killed by invisible people. However to be fair, this was my first few times playing it and I'm still getting the hang of the controls.

[Jakenz]

while the MPs not perfect. me and my friend played free roam for 3 hours last night. it was amazing. we were testing out all the cool shit you could do. like bashing the roters off the heli. cutting OTHER helis in half with the blades. also if you jump out your player crunches up into a ball before impact from a high place. ......jumping INTO the blades we done heaps of shit like that. im yet to try deathmatch but it MAY be bust.

[Zidane]

It's pretty cool... keep in mind everything you see in the multiplayer mode in synchronized, so every ped/car/object/effect/sounds/voices/lighting/time of day, everything is totally synched. Plus the 16 players, so it is pretty amazing they were able to pull it off. Unfortunately the duck and cover system could be better, and with auto aim things can get pretty cheap... but it is an amazing experience. You'll never get to experience flying in a helicopter over a city, at night in a rainstorm with other players wreaking havoc below you like you do in GTA4.

[phreak]

The online with PS3 has well...sucked. Can't even connect 90% of the time.

[ENFORC3R]

I'm not sure if we're all actually playing the same game. GTA4 MP is the business. The GTA Race alone would be worthy of a stand-alone game IMO. And don't get me started with Crooks N Cops and Hangman's Noose. Just amazing.

[treab]

i cant even connect to the server on my ps3 edition... did mean 6 hours on the single player mode though :D on the second island now... :smoke:

[Comeback209]

MP is the funnest thing I've ever played. Haven't touched the story much yet.

[GrungeRockCity]

I've been messing around more with the single player than multiplayer, myself. And I don't have much issue with MP, other than it kinda lagging when there's a lot going on, and sometimes not being able to connect. When it's all working in my favor though, it's pretty damn nice.

[}{oT~dEv1L 666]

I've been messing around more with the single player than multiplayer, myself. And I don't have much issue with MP, other than it kinda lagging when there's a lot going on, and sometimes not being able to connect. When it's all working in my favor though, it's pretty damn nice.

Seems like PSN has lots of issues. Xbox LIVE was great, there wasn't a problem at all. I was doing free roam with a couple of guys, and there was like no lag at all, it was just like the single player! I don't know, I'm not a fanboy, and I personally don't like going against Sony (I loved the PSP and PS2), but it seems that EVERYTHING is going against them. I mean, 360 only has RROD, PS3 has much more minor problems. I was deciding on buying a PS3, but seeing that it had so many issues, I bought a 360 for GTAIV.

[Neil]

I'm not making a fanboy comment here either, but I have tried multiple games online on PSN and the whole experience was either really laggy or it didn't feel like you were actually connected to anyone at all. The worst game for this is Gran Turismo 5: Prologue, where you're simply thrown into a room for one race where there's no voice chat or interaction and you all drive around a track watching each other lag about.

I think this is something Sony really need to work on. Yeah, it's a free service, but if you're giving away rotten eggs for free, I'm still going to go to the store and buy some nice fresh ones. Sorry!

[The Laugh]

Neil, it looks to me like you're complaining that the multiplayer mode is a GTA game and not a tactical shooter. If that's so then why the hell did you bother buying the game?

[Neil]

I'm not complaining that it's not a tactical shooter (those games really annoy me, like Rainbow Six and suchlike), but if you look at many other games you'll see that in order for a game to make a successful transition from one player vs the computer to one player vs other players then you need to make a few tweaks, even if they are only in the interests of making the game seem fair.

As I've said already, the game needs to be fun and exciting to keep my interest. I have a number of other games on my shelf which I've had much more fun playing online with. Yeah, it's cool that all the pedestrians and the cars and everything else are synchronised, but this is merely a novelty. I don't think this time next week I'll still be gawping at this, and then it's going to come down to a straight out fight for my attention between this and the other games I have.

I'm going to give it a lot more time, of course. Maybe I've just missed something. Make no mistake though, I bought this game because it was GTA online, hoping that they'd have put as much care and attention into that as they have the single player.

[Kriptakanakuh]

I played Halo 3 and COD4 MP the first nights the game came on. I remember HATING those games, because the online was not perfect. No one knew what they were doing, so on and so on.

Give GTA 4 a mp patch to fix a few of the bugs and you will be playing this game next summer too.

[Kodo]

the multiplayer is the bomb. if you're having problems with the killing you need to get more experience with it. same with driving modes. it's definitely NOT a pot luck. it seems that way at first, but as you get more adept at the controls, the weapons and their locations, and how to use the environment, you will be able to destroy people time after time. try playing with the different blip settings on the radar, that plays a big role.

there's so many good modes to choose from, and playing with your best friends makes for so much fun. there has never been a multiplayer with this much freedom. use it to really get the best out of the experience.

[Koolio]

ya i must say this has provided me with the most fun in a mp ive ever had

[Neil]

Freedom is great. Throwing people into a giant map which is far too big for the action ever to fill is not.

[iKlipse]

I don't understand you Neil, sometimes you don't even seem to be a GTA Fan with all this complaining of GTA IV and its Multi-player.

[Raziaar]

However, if it's two guys in a shootout, it really is just completely random who wins.

I find it's not random at all... at least with auto aim off. Real skill is required there, and surprisingly I come out on top a lot of the time, which surprises me since I suck ass with game pads.

Even with auto aim on, I find it's me who survives 80% of the time during firefights even with weaker weapons.

[baleent]

Freedom is great. Throwing people into a giant map which is far too big for the action ever to fill is not.

It's better than being with only two people stuck on one of the islands. Besides, neil, you would complain either way, if we were blocked from parts of the map in multiplayer. You seem to just love to pick out everything wrong with GTA. I suspect you do it to piss others off, but having the map completely open is part of that seamless, realistic GTA experience.

[-SPIKE-]

No, i agree with Neil Its just not as refined as you thought it would be. I'm dissapointed for the fact that you cant play bowling get drunk or play darts.. That was just going to be the fun part.

[baleent]

Maybe it'll be part of the DLC, synching everything even more, so we can bowl and stuff. Or whatever. I have barely explored a whole lot of the map, but even though there is a lack of interiors, there are several areas that are still pretty detailed surroundings to explore, just can't go inside.

[Sheep Shagger]

I've barely played MP yet, but I've liked what I tried so far. I'm really going to sink my teeth into it this weekend and try the different modes.

So far I've done a couple of DM's and TDM's - lag free and crazy fun, especially with 8 teams of 2! I've also done Hangman's NOOSE with a few buddies. Although we got separated early and only half of us made it to the waypoint, we all had fun playing it.

[Neil]

I spent some time yesterday doing regular Race (as opposed to GTA Race) and I came to a few conclusions:

Race is better than GTA Race (but still not as much fun as PGR4 or Forza Motorsport 2)
Boat races are immensely boring
Helicopter races are difficult
Cannonball Run is a lot of fun

[Sheep Shagger]

After a marathon session with 5 friends last night I have to say... The MP absolutely rules. We couldn't stop laughing and yelling the whole time - needless to say my wife was mighty pissed at me when I finally came up to bed at 2am.

Cops and Crooks was a riot and even with only 3 on each team it was never too hard to end up in a fire fight before the escape point. Races were great, but as Neil said Boat Races were very boring and slow paced. Chopper races were an instant fav, and try racing Faggio's around Times Square in a rain storm for some laughs.

Great game, it's just a little deeper than many other MP games (in that there is a lot to learn and different things to do) so it took us a bit to get our bearings. Games like COD 4 and Halo 3 were a little easier to just jump in and play but once you get into GTA MP for a while with some good people I think you'll see it shine.

I'm officially addicted.

[Neil]

Ah but here's where I think it falls down - it's not as good a shooter as Call of Duty and it's not as good a driving game as Project Gotham Racing. I'm going to find it hard to keep going back to GTA when these games are better at what they do.

[the punisher]

So, you're saying you expected PGR and CoD in GTA IV?

[Neil]

No, I didn't expect that. What I did expect was a game which would be better than the sum of its parts, like the single player is. It simply doesn't hold together well online.

[Sheep Shagger]

No, I didn't expect that. What I did expect was a game which would be better than the sum of its parts, like the single player is. It simply doesn't hold together well online.

Have you played with a good crew yet? I think it makes all the difference. I'll PM you when my friends and I get another big game going together, but since you're in the UK and 5 hrs ahead it'll probably have to be next weekend.

Lots of team chatter + a friendly rivalry between teams = big win.

[the punisher]

No, I didn't expect that. What I did expect was a game which would be better than the sum of its parts, like the single player is. It simply doesn't hold together well online.I have yet to try it, but from what I hear it's really good. CoD focuses solely on FPS, PGR/GT focus solely on racing, GTA is mixing both, so it can't be as sophisticated since it is not specializing in any specific genre.

[Neil]

Just had another awful game of deathmatch online. The sync issues are really bad - cars can warp in from nowhere, players suddenly move from one side of the street to the other and weapons are horribly imbalanced.

This game is absolutely terrible online. It's the sort of crap everyone ridiculed Saints Row's multiplayer for, and it's now clear that doing a game like this online just doesn't work. I'm walking along, spot a guy with 2 blocks of health (I have full health) and he wins the fight even though he has a worse gun than me?

Utter bullshit. (And no, before anyone says it, I don't have issues in other games. I'm using a wired connection to a router connected to an 8MBit downstream/400Kbit upstream connection)

[thenotsogoodtrickster]

Were you host, though? If so then you have a good right to complain, otherwise it really seems like you're only problem is a connection problem.

[Jonny98]

Its ok.. but come on now.. this game isn't COD4 which is built around multiplayer.. gta is build for single player.. yah its great they put it in but you should judge the game on there first multiplayer addiction to the game..

[Sheep Shagger]

6 of us played for over 6 hours straight last night with not one issue at all - I hosted all the matches. Chances are that whoever was selected as host for the match you played had a crap connection.

Saints Row was totally unplayable online when I had it, and I have the same internet service then that I do now. That being said, we did have issues trying to do party matches with other people - one person almost always got booted or didn't make it into the lobby.

[the punisher]

Just had another awful game of deathmatch online. The sync issues are really bad - cars can warp in from nowhere, players suddenly move from one side of the street to the other and weapons are horribly imbalanced.

This game is absolutely terrible online. It's the sort of crap everyone ridiculed Saints Row's multiplayer for, and it's now clear that doing a game like this online just doesn't work. I'm walking along, spot a guy with 2 blocks of health (I have full health) and he wins the fight even though he has a worse gun than me?

Utter bullshit. (And no, before anyone says it, I don't have issues in other games. I'm using a wired connection to a router connected to an 8MBit downstream/400Kbit upstream connection) I think you might have some port configuration trouble, Neil. Remember how it took you one hour to download 11% of the MGO beta, while everyone else was playing it fine with no lag whatsoever?

[Neil]

I have no problems whatsoever in any other Xbox Live game.

[thenotsogoodtrickster]

I have no problems whatsoever in any other Xbox Live game.

As I said earlier, it might be a case of you not getting host and being unlucky enough to end up with someone with dial-up.

[keshman87]

i have been playing ps3 MP for the past 2 days fine now, no real lag issues

still the only complaint is that you cant see what server your joining and you have no choice, and when you quit a MP game you have to go back to SP just to join anothe MP game!!!!

[Sheep Shagger]

I have no problems whatsoever in any other Xbox Live game.

I'll say it again bro, it's likely the host of games you've joined that has the bad connection - not you. Have you tried hosting your own game and letting others join?

[the punisher]

Hold on. On the 360, YOU host the game? I mean, ALL connections go to your unit, where you have to upload data to all those connected to your unit? I thought all servers were handled by M$, and that by hosting you were simply reserving space on the server. Is that the case?

[Sheep Shagger]

Hold on. On the 360, YOU host the game? I mean, ALL connections go to your unit, where you have to upload data to all those connected to your unit? I thought all servers were handled by M$, and that by hosting you were simply reserving space on the server. Is that the case?

My understanding (and I'm technologically retarded) is that there are no dedicated servers, it's all peer-to-peer. If I'm wrong, feel free to correct me. I'm sure there is more to it than that, as I know MS does have servers.

[Trumpormonkey]

My understanding (and I'm technologically retarded) is that there are no dedicated servers, it's all peer-to-peer. If I'm wrong, feel free to correct me. I'm sure there is more to it than that, as I know MS does have servers.

I'm pretty sure PSN is the one with servers, and the Xbox Live is the p2p one.

[BC Rich]

Yeah, it's a free service, but if you're giving away rotten eggs for free, I'm still going to go to the store and buy some nice fresh ones. Sorry!

ha yeah that's true. but it could be your connection. one of my friend's psn works pretty good. hardly see any lagging or anything like that

[Sheep Shagger]

I'm pretty sure PSN is the one with servers, and the Xbox Live is the p2p one.

Yeah I was talking about the 360, but I wasn't very clear about that.