I can't wait for this game to come out for PC... Seems that every game always comes out ~2 months after console release.

I REALLY like the fact you can hop fences now.. and CLIMB things.

I'm tryin to get my character to be a HUGE blob of a guy, but it's takin forever.. I've been eating the full meals at the pizza/burger shops (the unhealthy fatty ones), but so far, nothing changed.

You do an awful lot of running, and after a while, regardless of what you eat, it seems your fat meter goes DOWN.

I dunno, I'll have to play with the system a bit I guess. If anyone gets any info/detail on it, post it!

Not only can you climb things but you can actually SWIM.......it's about damn time. I was so sick of drowning when my car flew into the water.

So is this game out now or what? I have it pre-ordered (or my little brother does, actually), and I have the receipt, but heard that it wouldn't be out until later this month. Maybe I should give EB a call...

It's out Tuesday. Everyone who has it downloaded from the net.

:) nice. Very nice. If I had a DVD burner I'd be sending out a few PM's, but alas I do not. Oh well; I guess I can hold out until my li'l bro lets me borrow it.

I can't say why I know, but it is a dual-layer DVD. Yet another reason not to download an "early release" version. :-)

Bingle

According to IGN, it is dual-layer. I'm sure I've read it at Gamespot, too.

Makes me wonder what's missing out of the pirated GTA.

Some cool voice actors again.

Carl Johnson - Young Maylay
Sweet Johnson - Faizon Love
Ryder - MC Eiht
Cesar - Clifton Collins Jr
Kendl Johnson - Yo Yo
Zero - David Cross
OG Loc - Jonathan Anderson
Frank Tenpenny - Samuel L. Jackson
Maddog - Ice T
The Truth - Peter Fonda
Wu Zi Mu - James Yaegashi
Ran Fali (Farlie) - Hunter Platin
Mike Torreno - James Wood
Maccer - Shaun Ryder
Eddie Pulaski - Chris Penn
Officer Hernandez - Armando Riesco
Jizzy B - Charlie Murphy
T-Bone Mendez - Kid Frost
Ken Rosenberg - William Fichtner

To play burned PS2 games on a DVD-R, dont you need a MOD chip or something?

Indeed ya do.

Er, I don't remember, but don't you have to have a specific CD drive in your PS2 to run dual-layer games? If that's the case, how do I check, and replace it if I have to?

Was going to wait until the PC release to get it, but now that I see they've worked Ken Rosenberg in...

No. I believe that was a rumor at one point. But it'll work on all models.

Gamespot has their review up. They have it a 9.6. Pimp that shit here - http://www.gamespot.com/ps2/action/gta4/review.html.

Thanks for the reassurance, Jeff. I am going to pick up my copy from EB in 10 minutes. Hooray!

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas just received a score of 9.9 from IGN.com:

I'm picking it up in an hour. :)

-Lasereth

oh my Jesus.........

Wow! 9.9 from IGN.

School works keeping me busy though. And since I know if I start playing this it'll absolutely DESTROY my productivity, I'm going to try to refrain from playing it until Christmas break. Methinks it'll pose a larger challange than quitting smoking, but I'll do my best.

I felt Vice City was much better than GTA3. I'm expecting just as big of an improvement for this installment.

Just got back from picking it up, this game is great and a huge improvement over Vice City. The fact that there is no load time between areas is so good you wonder how you just sat and waited for it to load.

Right now I'm rocking the afro with beard combo and starting to get a little gut by drinking lots of soda and eating nothing but pizza, no salad.

I went to EBGames to pick this up for my li'l bro, and it was a travesty. All of the workers had bandanas on, and the clerk had a toy gun and a 40 oz. of "Malt Liquor" (probably apple juice) that he was drinking out of. They even had these black guys come who just stood around trying to look all tough (can anybody say, "racist"?). I just handed 'em my receipt and got the heck outta there before someone took my picture in there.

Oh yeah; the clerks all had "Life" and "Death" 'tatooed' on their knuckles.

Are you serious? There's no way that was approved by Head Office. What city was that in?

On another note... I work there and I haven't had a change to play it. Our new legislature in Canada makes it illegal for us to sell M games to minors, so I was wondering if someone could tell me how much worst this is compared to Vice City? Its my job to keep parents informed on what their kids purchase, and I'd like to be able to tell them an honest answer. What I'm getting at is, can a few of you please tell me all the questionable material in the game, preferrably in a list?

Example:

Prostitution
Violence (Obvious)
Drive-by shootings
Language... etc

Thanks in advance!

(If you're wondering why I just don't play it myself, its because I don't have a PS2 and my store has no extra copies to pop in the interactives :p)

I went to go pick it up and the pre-order line streched out the door and around the corner. I was to meet my friends in half an hour twenty minutes away, so I just said screw it and went there. I'll pick it up in the morning. It's not like I was going to play it this late anyw...all right, I'm lying. If I had it I'd be playing it. :)

Well, I picked up my copy about six hours ago, and played it for about five hours. So far, it seems really cool. I actually preferred GTA III to Vice City, but so far, the game seems to have improved on Vice City in some key areas. I'm not sure yet how I'm going to feel about the whole 'stat' thing. I don't really want to have to stop to find something to eat every few hours or spend a whole lot of time training up my muscle stat. So far, it seems like that aspect is going to be okay, but I'm sort of reserving judgment until I've played a bit more. The frustrating thing about Vice City were those missions/side quests that were just a little too difficult -- they seemed to depend too much on luck rather than on skill, and it remains to be seen if San Andreas will fall into the same trap. In any case, it's a great game so far.

Sorry, bro, but I'm not one to rat out a group of workers who're just trying to make their job a little bit more fun unless they're being especially obnoxious or unsafe. With no disrespect to you, but sorry, I plead the 5th when it comes to which branch they were in.

As far as how much "worse" (better) it is than Vice City, here is what I've seen after about an hour of gameplay:
- Lots and LOTS of F-Bombs.
- When jacking a car, you actually sock your victim in the face before stealing the car.
- Crooked cops.
- CJ jumps a lot higher than Tommy Vercetti (White Men Can't Jump?).
- Gangs will harass you before physically confronting you.
- Graffiti.
- Lots and lots of racial stereotypes.

Yeah, it has really, really bad language. :) Not for kids if they didn't grow up around F-Bombs.

-Lasereth

I'm going to try and rent it later today. Gamespot's review is very postitive --9.6/10 I think--but I'm kinda wary of the character building aspects like fitness and diet. (The Sims: Bustin' Caps, anyone?)

It seems like it'll be another good game from Rockstar, but I still crave serious multiplayer. Gamespot mentioned that there are brief co-op parts, but some split-screen co-op similar to Halo's system would be very, very cool.

Wow, the Gamestop I went to didn't go that far, but they did have GTA bandanas, hats, and t-shirts.

Haha, awesome!

Just curious, how is that racist? It fits the game. The main character is black his buds hang out, wear bandanas and some walk around w/ 40s.

No different than releasing Vice City and, say, dressing up like the Mafia! Just some fun to fit the theme of the game!

AMAZING.... I'm a bit disappointed by the graphics (used to Vice City on the Xbox) but other than that its amazing. Awesome soundtrack, great atmosphere, and overall more realistic than the previous GTA games. So far the most fun thing has been spraypainting people in the face - they fall over and grab at their head, caughing. The climbing is another nice addition, though I haven't had much chance to play with it yet.

Well, it took two hours to hit my first bug. I attempted to get off a motorcycle just as a gangbanger was about to pull me off, and I got stuck in the motorcycle, unable to target enemies or move and was gunned down. Still, I'm enjoying it, although Lance's betrayal in VC has me looking everywhere for potential backstabbers. I feel very poor. The whole "getting respect instead of money" thing is cool, but I want to buy things.
By the way, this is the first GTA where I copped out and bought the strat guide up front. The thing is almost 300 pages. Ill.

i didn't knwo there was 2 player segments niiiiiice

Actually, sorry, I was wrong. The game is single-layer.

Bingle

Speaking of bugs, I found one earlier too. I was playing pool at the bar and the cue had pushed the ball into the pocket while still touching it, and the game froze up. Other than that, fairly bug free. I just hope there isn't a "purple 9's" style bug in it.

Also, the training/special attack button is really nice - melee combat is actually more than random button mashing now.

I am pleased that they took elements of other popular games and incorporated them; I'm currently trying to get past a stealth mission, and I had to do a couple of DDR challenges, which were sort of annoying. However, there is a mission early on in which you ride on the back of a motorcycle shooting pursuers: awesome. A mission I expect to play again and again (thanks to the fact that I left a save right before it :)).

Just picked it up from eb games. I'm waiting to play it after the Bosox-cards game is over. I loved GTAIII but didn't really get into the VC story much and couldn't finish it hopefully the SA magic will be closer to gta III for me

I just bought it for 30$ from a kid because his mom wouldn't let him play it. I was literally walking out the door at work to go buy it when he brought it in :)

I've been playing and hour or two and It's great. I don't get the bad press it's getting. Considering the theme of the game it's expected. I've listened to my fair share of gangster rap and a few movies and and it's no worse. Vice City and GTA3 both stereotyped cultures, and this stereotype just happens to curse more :) I figured Critics would have gotten over the GTA series by now.

There's one thing that I hate though, training requires button mashing and my carpal tunnel is NOT liking it. I'm trying to figure out how to make this macro on this controller work.

Sure it fits the game, but the game itself is racist! lol I dunno...I just wonder what I would say if I was a black guy, and someone came up to me and said, "Hey, can you go hang out at this videogame store for awhile? We're trying to promote this new game about stealing cars, murder, and gangs, and we need a bunch of black guys like you to make them feel like they're inside the game."
Think about it.