Anyone who is a fan of racing games has probably played some of the Midnight Club series. This is Rockstar’s other franchise. The games look great, but can be a tad difficult. Here is the latest trailer for the sequel in LA.
Your multiplayer issues for GTA IV may be over. Rockstar has released a patch that will fix many of the problems that has been plaguing some users. Here is what the patch will take care of:
1. Fixed an issue where players were unable to enter or exit vehicles in GTA Race.
2. Fixed an issue where scripted vehicles were causing games to unexpectedly crash.
3. Improved reliability and frequency of PS3™ online leaderboard updates.
4. Fixed a rare hang some players encountered when moving from a Race or GTA Race lobby into gameplay.
5. Fixed a hang that would occur when players were switching teams during the countdown in the lobby.
6. Fixed an issue where players were able to get ridiculously high scores from Cops ‘n Crooks matches.
7. Changed GTA Race and Race so that the last player remaining always receives a reward of $250.
8. Fixed an issue where spectating players would prevent the game from finishing.
9. Fixed an issue where players were unable to spectate in Round 2 of Cops ‘n Crooks games.
10. Changed countdown timer in lobby so that it no longer resets when new players join a game.
11. Changed the kick option so that kicked players are no longer brought back to single player.
Rockstar is one of the best at updating their software in a timely fashion. The jumped real fast when Bully had its problems and they have really made sure that GTA IV stays a multiplayer juggernaut for months to come.
Don’t rush to finish your copy of GTA IV just yet if you have the Xbox 360 version. Take Two reports that the content will not be available until at least November 2008. From their press release:
The Company is providing guidance for the third fiscal quarter ending July 31, 2008 and fourth fiscal quarter ending October 31, 2008 and is raising its guidance for the fiscal year ending October 31, 2008 as detailed below. Fiscal 2008 guidance reflects the release of the first installment of episodic content for Grand Theft Auto IV for Xbox 360 in the first quarter of fiscal 2009 instead of the fourth quarter of fiscal 2008 in order to provide a better balance in Take-Two’s release schedule.
Can’t say I’m surprised. It seems that they want to finish Midnight Club: LA before they return to GTA IV.
Quick get the folks form Roswell here to look at this, there may be aliens in my video game! LOL. OK maybe not, I am thinking it was a glitch of a plane flying by at night in the game. Pretty funny how gamers find these things, maybe Rockstar has hidden aliens in the game once you get all 100% finished.
If you are a frequent visitor of Rockstar’s Social Club, then you will remember that everytime you tried to click through to the multiplayer section, you were told to come back later. Well, later has arrived. Multiplayer stats are now trackable at the site and you can view all your multi glory anytime you want.
Note: You have to link your PSN or XBL account to your Rockstar account. After you login/register, go to edit profile and follow the steps to link to your appropriate account. Otherwise, you can’t do anything inside the club.
Everyone by now is familiar with the voice of Niko Belic, GTA IV’s main character. What you may not be aware of is that the voice actor that is provided the voice for Niko, which is almost iconic now, only got paid $100,000 for the job and does not see a residual penny after that.
In a New York Times article, Hollick revealed that he earned about $100,000 for 15 months of work recording dialogue for his role as GTA IV’s protagonist. The game, however, has gone on to rake in over $600 million in a mere two weeks.
Hollick does not hold a grudge against Rockstar, but instead says the following:
I don’t blame Rockstar. I blame our union for not having the agreements in place to protect the creative people who drive the sales of these games.
A weak union is to blame for this voice actor and possibly many others getting left out in the cold while the GTA IV money train and others like it roll on by. Some are speculating that this could lead to a possible strike of voice actors against Hollywood, if you think about it the voices in a video game are pivotal to it’s success, just imagine GTA IV without Roman or Niko.
So everyone thought that GTA IV would do well, but Guinness was keeping their eye on this one for some time now. Looks like Rockstar with GTA IV has spanked the previous record for the highest grossing video game in it’s first 24 hours on the market. This title previously was held by the MS juggernaut that is Halo 3, it also beat out Spider Man 3 and Harry Potter. GTA has already solidified it’s place in the record books and in gamer’s hearts already. Bravo to Rockstar.
Here is the official word:
The famed Grand Theft Auto series has made headlines yet again! As newly-released sales figures show, Grand Theft Auto IV has crushed the competition by selling 3.6 million units and earning $310 million in its first day of release, earning Guinness World Records™ for the Highest Grossing Video Game in 24 Hours and the Highest Revenue Generated by an Entertainment Product in 24 Hours. These records establish GTA IV as the most profitable entertainment release of all-time, far surpassing other video game, film and book releases. According to Guinness World Records™, this is how the game stacks up against the competition:
Fastest-selling video game in 24 hours: Halo 3 at $170 million
Fastest-selling theatrical movie in 24 hours: Spider-Man 3 at $60 million
Fastest-selling book in 24 hours: Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows at $220 million
Rockstar has thrown the ball back at Sony in terms of the freezing issues plaguing PS3 gamers with Grand Theft Auto IV. Apparently, Rockstar didn’t do any testing with the 60GB console and the extra hardware inside is what’s causing the issue. At least that’s what they told a forum poster over at the official PlayStation forums.
So let me get this straight. I bought a 60GB console so I could have complete backwards compatibility and now there’s issues caused by that SKU? I hope Sony gets this straightened out so these issues don’t ever come up again because of differences in internal parts.
We’ll keep you posted as we hear more from Sony and Rockstar regarding the issue.
Rockstar may have hidden a clue to upcoming expansions on GTA IV on their Social Club website. An astute reader over at GTAForums found the above ticket on the Story Gang portion of the site by dragging a few items around on the screen.
There are three options here. The first is that it means nothing, which is highly unlikely. The second is that we’ll be seeing a new game where Niko travels to San Andreas in the near future. The third is that San Andreas will be part of the DLC for the Xbox 360 version of the game. Since no one knows exactly what the Xbox 360 version of the game is getting, we’ll have to speculate. I personally think this will end up being a new game at retail. Sure, Microsoft floated Rockstar a ton of money, but creating an entire new story and all the textures and graphics for an entire city? You also will have to take file size into account, as this type of expansion would end up needing at least 4GB of space for all the graphics and gameplay elements.
Only time will tell, though, on what this really means. We’ll keep you posted.
GTA IV is still spinning in my console disc trays and already Rockstar is out looking for a location for GTA V. Could it be they want to get the ball rolling before EA comes in and just rehashes GTA IV? Here’s the list of choices going down at Rockstar:
Beijing, China
Paris, France
Havana, Cuba
Cancun, Mexico
Venice, Italy
Not sure how I feel about Venice, although you could try and sink the city. I think the best choices would either be Havana, Cuba or Cancun, Mexico. Some decent debauchery already happens there, which could make a pretty good settings. Only time will tell, though.
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