GTAIV really is......

as good as the interweb hype would have you believe. I've only played STORY MODE so far. Trying to become more proficient in controlling Niko and his driving before I jump into multi-player.

I hadn't planned on hitting one of the Mid-night release stores until earlier in the evening. I was already up at my folks place around 9ish, and since the drive home takes me past 3 diff Gamestop's, I just hung out at my parents until 10:45pm, got to the Gamestop by 11pm. I was going to drive by another store right down the road, but when I saw that there was only 15-20 ppl outside, I parked and jumped in line. That's not the funny part!

Once i get to the counter and ask for the 360 version, the guy asked for my "pre-order receipt". Which I didn't have bcuz I didn't pre-order. He kinda looked down at me and said, "Midnight release is ONLY for those who PRE-ORDERED" and that they only had 3 "extra" copies to sell. I almost laughed, but instead, realized I was on the verge of losing out on the early release and said something to the effect of "If you don't sell it to me after waiting in line for an hr with a bunch of smelly, zit-faced geeks", but before i could continue he rang me up. Whew!

So far I'd say I'm at the 2hr mark......so with another 38 or so to go, yes. I haven't even cracked the game's surface. But what I have done so far is mastered the map/phone system. And fighting/shooting for the most part. Killed a couple of targets. Jacked and subsequently totaled a few cars around Queens, and Brooklyn.(Broker & Dukes)

The game comes with another one of those fold out maps. Only Liberty City seems far more massive than San Andreas did on the maps. And it contains other info about the city/game along it's edges on both sides. Pretty cool.