At the time of release critics were giving GTA IV 5/5 and 10/10, praising especially the down to earth gritty story, believable and troubled characters and Liberty city it's self which was great satire of modern society. The reaction from gamers has been much more mixed especially on my thread on the GTA V forum, where most gamers are condeming the serious tone and labeling it boring. This is drawing me ever closer to the sad conclusion that while critics want gaming to progress and become something truly astounding there is at least a substantial portion of gamers that just want gaming to remain locked in a world of male adolescent stupidity.

You might want to prepare for an incoming shitstorm, sir.

I'm not a critic and I think GTA4 deserved the scores it got. I probably put more hours into it than any other GTA... Alot of critics find story to be an incredibly important aspect of media and many "gamers" are in it for "fun" so maybe that has something to do with it?

It's because you never really caught onto how lacking it was until you'd put some pretty serious time into it. Also, you would have had to put equal time into the other GTAs to notice it.

GTA4 is a great game. I don't ever want to play it, and only ever enjoyed 3, but I don't think anyone would say it's unworthy of praise.

GTA fans only commented on lack of features introduced in past games like jets and what not (feel free to elaborate). It was never panned as a bad game.

I don't feel people saying it deserved a 9 or 9.5 instead of 10/10 is disconnect between reviewers and the average gamer. All I know is MGS4 came out shortly after and that's the 10/10 I was waiting for.

@General_Mapache said:

At the time of release critics were giving GTA IV 5/5 and 10/10, praising especially the down to earth gritty story, believable and troubled characters and Liberty city it's self which was great satire of modern society. The reaction from gamers has been much more mixed especially on my thread on the GTA V forum, where most gamers are condeming the serious tone and labeling it boring. This is drawing me ever closer to the sad conclusion that while critics want gaming to progress and become something truly astounding there is at least a substantial portion of gamers that just want gaming to remain locked in a world of male adolescent stupidity.

It rubbed a portion of people that were looking for the next san andreas the wrong way. That's it. I personally really loved it. The shooting, the physics, the world felt real to me. It was the first time it felt like the 360 was truly next-gen.

Lets let this one go people.

I didn't mind the story, however, I hated the overall flow of the game. Particularly the nonexistence of reasonable checkpoints during missions and the constant chattering of your cellphone from people I honestly didn't care about. The core game design philosophy felt flawed for this generation, not the story telling.

Its from this that I've gleamed that a Rockstar game is probably good if it isn't made by Rockstar North.

I enjoyed it. That's all that matters.

@General_Mapache said:

At the time of release critics were giving GTA IV 5/5 and 10/10, praising especially the down to earth gritty story, believable and troubled characters and Liberty city it's self which was great satire of modern society. The reaction from gamers has been much more mixed especially on my thread on the GTA V forum, where most gamers are condeming the serious tone and labeling it boring. This is drawing me ever closer to the sad conclusion that while critics want gaming to progress and become something truly astounding there is at least a substantial portion of gamers that just want gaming to remain locked in a world of male adolescent stupidity.

I think it was the complete opposite. Most gamers who disliked the game I think felt like the 'serious tone' of GTA IV was actually extremely weak, not informed at all by the gameplay, and lacked a lot of narrative cohesion. It seemed that critics were taken in by the superficial nature, whereas gamers just weren't so easily fooled. I think a better example of disconnect are games like Alpha Protocol and Nier, which have big cult followings and got a lot of positive reactions from gamers, whilst critics ignored, dismissed, or gave mediocre, ill-informed reviews.

It's not the critics who are asking for games to go beyond shooting as primary mechanics, it's gamers. It's not critics who are touting games which have innovation but poor graphics, it's gamers. And it's not critics who are cynical about sequelitis, no new IPs, and cop-outs (ME3), it's gamers.

If by that you mean there's a minority on the internet who'll hate on anything, then yes. There are a lot more fans than critics, so proportionally there are going to be a lot more people who hate it.

I have yet to meet a gamer IRL who hates on GTA IV. Although some do think that SA was better that doesn't translate to IV being terrible.

I very much enjoyed it but I can't say it is one of my favorite games. The story and characters were well done, as they always are in Rockstar games, but it was a bit long winded and the gameplay was kinda awkward.

Also calling people who disagree with you stupid and adolescent is you know, pretty stupid and adolescent.

i had a really good time with gta 4 and the expansions so im hyped for gta 5.

There were a lot of critics that months later said they maybe had over rated it or they just didn't like it as much as they used to.

Just because you and a swarm of angry internet forum posters didn't like GTAIV doesn't mean the other 22 million who bought it didn't.

@Cincaid said:

Just because you and a swarm of angry internet forum posters didn't like GTAIV doesn't mean the other 22 million who bought it didn't.

I think it's great, but when you spend 50 hours doing something it's easier to remember why you are currently bored rather than why you liked it in the first place.  I don't think it's a dissonance between critics and the audience, but a between the past and present.
 
Sure people will line up to talk about why they don't like a popular thing, but did anyone dislike GTA4 on day one?

I'll take the word of a critic over the raving mob any day of the week.

GTA IV was fucking amazing.

It did not age well.

@IAmNotBatman said:

I'm not a critic and I think GTA4 deserved the scores it got. I probably put more hours into it than any other GTA... Alot of critics find story to be an incredibly important aspect of media and many "gamers" are in it for "fun" so maybe that has something to do with it?

It was the only GTA game I was actually ever interested in finishing. Not that I didn't enjoy the old one's just never cared enough about the stories to finish them.

I would have given GTA 5/5 on my first few days with it too.

I thought it was the best GTA. The gameplay wasn't amazing, but the standard wasn't exactly high at the time. Now RDR takes the top spot for best open world game made by Rockstar. 

I think at the time people were wrapped up in it's gorgeous visuals, and wonderful physics. But as time went on we slowly realized that as a game there wasn't much there. Looking back the driving didn't control well, the cover mechanics were clunky and the shooting didn't feel very solid. Not to mention the abusive nature of time wasting missions, like dating and taking your friends out to party.

It lost focus is what I'm saying.

Maybe it has more to do with the shitty gameplay?

I really enjoyed GTA IV when it first came out. Like so many others I was blown away by how realistic and full of detail the game was.

It was only in retrospect and after attempting to go back and play it again that I realized how fucking boring it actually is.

gta 4 is really good game compaed to all the stuff this gen it just lacks content compared to the vice city and san andreas

Critics are hypebeasts.

I did not enjoy GTA IV at all. The game felt like a chore to play.

No checkpoints, annoying attempts to you immerse into the world via annoying "friends" asking to go bowling (The world phone interface was slow and cumbersome everything an interface shouldn't be), while poorly integrating gameplay into the story as it betrays the very character of Niko, half baked multiplayer and a very very disappointing soundtrack. Some of the reasons I didn't end up finishing GTA IV, although some of it was my fault for hyping it up beyond what it could have achieved but I learnt a valuable lesson to never over-hype things. I have reasonable hopes for V and will definitely give it a fair shot.

(And thankfully Rockstar restored a lot of my good will with the superb Red Dead Redemption.)

My favourite GTA, but there are more consumers than critics. So many people bought the game there are bound to be millions who didn't like it and millions who did. Not a disconnect, just a huge audience with a highly vocal section of people who like to type of message boards. When it came out I didn't go on a message board for weeks.

@9cupsoftea said:

@General_Mapache said:

At the time of release critics were giving GTA IV 5/5 and 10/10, praising especially the down to earth gritty story, believable and troubled characters and Liberty city it's self which was great satire of modern society. The reaction from gamers has been much more mixed especially on my thread on the GTA V forum, where most gamers are condeming the serious tone and labeling it boring. This is drawing me ever closer to the sad conclusion that while critics want gaming to progress and become something truly astounding there is at least a substantial portion of gamers that just want gaming to remain locked in a world of male adolescent stupidity.

I think it was the complete opposite. Most gamers who disliked the game I think felt like the 'serious tone' of GTA IV was actually extremely weak, not informed at all by the gameplay, and lacked a lot of narrative cohesion. It seemed that critics were taken in by the superficial nature, whereas gamers just weren't so easily fooled. I think a better example of disconnect are games like Alpha Protocol and Nier, which have big cult followings and got a lot of positive reactions from gamers, whilst critics ignored, dismissed, or gave mediocre, ill-informed reviews.

It's not the critics who are asking for games to go beyond shooting as primary mechanics, it's gamers. It's not critics who are touting games which have innovation but poor graphics, it's gamers. And it's not critics who are cynical about sequelitis, no new IPs, and cop-outs (ME3), it's gamers.

QFT

To me it was more of a Sims game than a rampage crime simulator.

I still play it and the expansions (BoGT makes up for a lot of the missing fun) today since I was kind of disappointed with the lack of technical improvements in Saints Row 3.

GTA 3 also seemed weak to me and I think part of it is the massive amount of resources spent on a new engine restricts the amount of new content.

Otherwise it might be that GTA fits better with non-contemporary period pieces.

GTA IV was great when it was released. Genres standards have grown higher since the four years ago when it was released. It did many things way better than any other game before it.

It's because your answers are from forums?

@AlisterCat said:

My favourite GTA, but there are more consumers than critics. So many people bought the game there are bound to be millions who didn't like it and millions who did. Not a disconnect, just a huge audience with a highly vocal section of people who like to type of message boards. When it came out I didn't go on a message board for weeks.

I find that is probably the best thing to do when a new game comes out that you really want to sink into. When Mass Effect 3 came out I stayed off the social aspect of the internet for a week or two. I loved the game. Came back to the internet and it was all going to Hell.

The disconnect is simple.

Everyday gamers don't have to account for anything other than their own enjoyment or lack thereof.

GTA IV was indeed a good game. Was it a 10? Absolutely not.

I personally had a lot more fun with San Andreas and Vice City.

I would say IV was a let down in my book, but still enjoyable. The game was just caught in a massive media hype wave.

And to me, first impressions were quite good. But after playing the game for awhile, I didn't care about the story, I cared that it wasn't that fun to play anymore.

I'm still sort of baffled by how much more I enjoyed Red Dead Redemption over GTA IV. . .

I really like that game and it's a super substantial piece of high quality content. I don't think reviewers were just giving it good reviews to advance the industry at large. I'd like to think that reviewers just gave it that because it was a good game....

You're wrong. IV's the best GTA to date.

@Hitchenson said:

IV's the best GTA to date.

Hear, hear!

I didn't like GTA IV but I loved Red Dead Redemption. All I'm saying is I hope there's a horse in GTA V.

GTA 4 had to many technical problems to warrant a perfect score.

I found the gameplay to be clunky - more than previous games anyway - the story to be awful, and most of the characters were arseholes. The whole 'I wanna be a good person so I'll shoot all these thousands of people in the face' was just stupid.

But other people enjoyed, and good on 'em.

What? I found GTA IV incredibly disappointing, but that's because I thought the story felt empty and (I thought) pretty stupid. I always attributed this to being from England, not the U.S.

I loved it. My friend was so-so with it and San Andreas is if favorite GTA. Some people wanted ridiculous and were sad when they didn't even though there was some pretty fucked up parts in the game.