re: Grand Theft Auto IV
GTA IV: The Lost and Damned Multiplayer Hands-on
GTA IV: The Lost and Damned Multiplayer Hands-on
Grand Theft Auto IV is set to get its first piece of downloadable content on February 17, and what a download it will be. You've likely already read our impressions of the 12-20 hour campaign the $20 download offers. Recently, we got a chance to try out the new multiplayer features and game modes being added. That's right, in addition to the all-new campaign, The Lost and Damned download includes six new modes to play on Xbox Live.
The first new game type we tried out was my favorite of the bunch. Called "Witness Protection," this mode is a team affair with one squad playing as The Lost biker gang and the other as the N.O.O.S.E. The goal of the N.O.O.S.E. is to deliver three state witnesses to the proper police stations while The Lost try to kill said witnesses. If you're playing as the good guys, one team member gets to drive the van with the witnesses making him the prime target while the rest of the team drives in cop cars. As I found out, it takes quite a bit of firepower to take down the van…and the van is pretty daunting when it starts trying to ram you and you're just chasing it on a small bike.
The next mode, "Own the City," is a GTA take on your standard territories match. Each team must try to take over as many territories as possible. There's just one catch: Each territory your team owns is populated by NPC characters to protect it while you're off taking over another.
The new race mode is a clear homage to the classic motorcycle game Road Rash. The goal is simple: travel through all of the checkpoints and reach the finish first. The catch is that everyone is on bikes and you can hold down the X or B buttons to charge up a baseball bat swing to knock the opposition on their tails.
The last mode we played is called "Chopper vs. Chopper." You can probably guess what that entails. The game is only played by two people, one on a motorcycle and one in a helicopter. If you're on the bike, it's your job to get to as many checkpoints scattered around the city as possible. If you're in the copter, all you need to do is kill the guy on the bike, either by shooting them down or embarrassing them by killing them with the copter blades. Once the player in the motorcycle is killed, the roles are reversed.
There is one more mode, but we didn't get a chance to try it out. This one, called "Club Business" has everyone playing as a member of The Lost. Different tasks are doled out that everyone will race to complete in order to gain favor with the gang. In the team-based version of this, Rockstar says you can gain money for your club by riding in formation.
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