Once upon a time, gaming was seen toy for children. I, was one of those children. With an NES, I had the zapper gun that would allow me to reenact a successful hunting trip with Dick Cheney. There were a multitude of accessories that were out there that may or may have not enhanced the experience but nonetheless were still available, notably Nintendo made the most for its system as a first party such as the Power Glove. However, by the time of the Playstation we saw these attachments and “zany” accessories slowly go away. The average controller had enough buttons and functions that making some variant of this would only hinder the player and contribute absolutely nothing. The Playstation’s Dual shock controller was the culmination of well planned design and functionality. Games such as Gran Turismo and Metal Gear Solid required both a number of features and precise actions to be used, for this, the controller was prefect providing absolutely what was needed and nothing more (for the most part at least). Going to the next few generations, all systems had a controller similar to the PS1’s Dual Shock. With 1-2 analog sticks, a d-pad, some face buttons, and some shoulder buttons. Of course Nintendo tried to break the mold of conformity and, in particular with the Gamecube, was met with mixed responses and a bunch of 3rd parties trying to figure out how to multi-platform with it.

As one of God knows how many people who got GTA4 on launch day I’ve been going at the game slowly but surely. I’m playing the 360 version and for the most part I’m pleased with what I see. I haven’t gotten to that “holy shit!” moment yet, but from what I read from others, I haven’t gotten too far in to actually get to that point. However, I did get my “hahaha, that’s pretty cool,” moment. This came when I was in Team Deathmatch and my friend, on Xbox Live, jumped into a car and asked my friend to get in. He had a submachine gun and was ready to do some drivebys. As soon as I begin moving Ginuwine’s “Pony” song came up.

Now for those who have or are becoming acquainted with the site, know that I love urban music to sing along in Xbox Live, but Ginuwine is not what I had in mind and instead proceeded to laugh my ass off as Ginuwine implied that he wanted women to ride his penis like a pony (this was back in the mid-90s when music was much more wholesome and hid some sexual innuendo). You can’t live out gangsta dreams with Ginuwine in the background is what I’m trying to say, but more to the point, there is so much detail packed into this game that you can easily miss so much just by doing what has become second nature since GTA3. But anyway, back to what I was talking about which was GTA4. The multiplayer is fun. Don’t expect to get rid of your Halo 3 or CoD4, because GTA4 is simple not that type of game. It’s more of side game you’ll play here and there after playing some single player. Rather than walking over to the console and switching out games to play online, you can simple use your in game cellphone to get into some matches, I like that simple yet intuitive style. I have not gone through much of the single player, but I’m working on it and expect a review soon.