Millions of geeks crouched even more intently than usual over their keyboards yesterday, awaiting the 6 PM reveal of the trailer for
Grand Theft Auto IV on the website of game maker Rock Star Games. They were not disappointed with what they found.
The trailer was rife with slow panning cityscape vistas heavily influenced by
Ron Fricke's lavish, time lapse cinematography for films such as
Baraka or
Koyaanisqatsi. The city presented is the sprawling metropolis of a revamped Liberty City, Rock Star's answer to New York. The star of the game seems to be a Russian mobster (with possible ex-KGB training?) but few other facts are presented.
As always, the game designers have gone the extra mile with their own poltically ambivalent take on culture jamming, littering the cityscape with insulting spins on the signage of blue chip corporations (the Met Life logo atop one skyscraper becomes Geta Life) as well as extremely harsh riffs on contemporary American pop culture. One of our favourites was the billboard for
America's Next Top Hooker, but IV, like San Andreas, Vice City and GTA III before it will no doubt be packed to the gills with those little details that make a life of digitally realized crime all the more fulfilling.
As for the
sound track, the setting seems quite contemporary, so it should be interesting to see which bands make the cut for the coveted positions on the radio playlists of the game. See you in October, or rather, I'll see you in January when I have completed the damn thing!