We're not finished with Grand Theft Auto just yet, but we are taking a bit of an unexpected departure to the handhelds of the day, with a callback to the top-down GTA's of yesteryear, in a story set very much in the thick of the GTA IV present that we've seen so much of.
When I said Liberty City is full of stories, I meant it, and Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars follows the criminal (obviously) life of Triad member Huang Lee, returning to the city to avenge his father's murder, and whatever other shenanigans he'll inevitably become embroiled in for various criminal enterprises.
It might look like a step down from Episodes of Liberty City, but this little package can still pack a punch.
Frustrations
Chinatown Wars was a huge hit on the Nintendo DS, which seems like a strange place for a GTA game to be, but when Nintendo DS's can be found seemingly everywhere it makes for a smart business decision.
I was hoping to emulate it but faced too many graphical issues and I simply couldn't be bothered to diagnose the issue there and then, especially knowing that a few months later it was ported to the beloved PlayStation Portable with updated graphics and no need for a stylus.
I say cutscene, more comic panels really. No animation, no voice acting on either system. It's almost in stark contrast to the rest of the game, really, which gets underway with a carjacking, and another minigame to get it going.
Fun Times
These minigames are going to be everywhere in Chinatown Wars, and they're often quite inventive and elaborate, making good use of the stylus, though you have to constantly switch between using it or the regular controls.
On the PSP side of things, each action is made a little simpler to compensate for the lack of touch controls, and it's not long before you wonder why this level of interactivity hasn't been attempted on the PlayStation Vita, outside of Tearaway. When done well, it really sets itself apart from other games.
But these comic panel minigames aside, what really sets Chinatown Wars apart, especially on the DS, is that the game manages to cram most of GTA IV's map onto a cartridge. Sure, it's a blockier, less detailed, more grid-like version of the city, but once you get your bearings it can be recognizable.
On the PSP here, it is even more detailed, even better looking, but still feels impressive despite making large compromises for obvious reasons.
Further Frustrations
The family sword was supposed to be delivered to Uncle Kenny here, who is from the very beginning a complete and utter arse. He doesn't need to be voiced or even animated for me to know this, the dialogue does it all for us, and he's not the only character who you won't care about as the game progresses.
Unfortunately for the Chinatown Wars, that lack of interest in the characters extends to Huang, too, mostly because I'm just not sure who he is as a person. He's just been shot in the head and left for dead, but this hasn't phased him. He wants revenge for his father's murder but errands for Uncle comes first.
Further Fun Times
Early missions in a GTA game are all about easing you into the gameplay, and this first one has us drive around to a film set and inquire as to why the folks there haven't reported back to Uncle Kenny, and it's here where a tooltip pops up to point out that cars automatically align themselves with the direction of the road by default.
This feature is wonderful in a game where you literally can't swing your camera around any corner or down any street to see what's in front of you. Chinatown Wars inherits all that is annoying with a top-down view, but at least allows you to make a turn, have your car align, and dare to speed up ever so slightly more than usual.
Doubly nice is that it doesn't snap your car to a lane, just to the direction of the road, so you can line yourself up in between lanes and not worry too much - though by the time you're settled you'll probably have to turn and do it all over again.
Arriving on the scene we're introduced to Ling, clearly designed to be someone Huang has the hots for but will get nowhere with, and we're also introduced to the way the police work this time around.
Chases that last an age and require smart driving (or simply driving in a straight line at high speeds) don't translate too well to the top-down view or the handhelds, and so they take on a slight minigame twist where your wanted stars are removed by getting rid of cop cars. If you shove one into some street furniture, or it happens to drive into oncoming traffic and gets wiped out, one car is removed from the chase and one star removed from the HUD.
You can still visit pay 'n sprays and drive carefully when they've lost you, but this solution will likely serve as the quickest method to drop the police presence, and in a game where you literally won't be able to see where the next cop car is until you're on top of it, you'll take whatever help you're given.
I've heard complaints about the lock-on, and it's not the smartest, but then neither are the enemies you face, so you might end up bumbling your way through Chinatown Wars for one reason or another.
Time to find a weapon, and our gang have hidden them inside red dumpsters all over the city, which we have to scramble through with quick presses of the shoulder buttons. I hope the world stands still while I'm doing all these minigames. Pretty sure it does. Would I rather have a glowing floating weapon pick-up like the old GTA games? In the sense that they'd stand out more than these red dumpsters, yes, but in general I think not.
I like what Chinatown Wars is trying here, even if it adds to the length of missions or will soon become repetitive.
So Ling's dead, and not in the sense of "haha, you only thought I was dead!", I've checked the GTA-Wiki and everything. Easily the best-written character of Chinatown Wars, she's been ripped apart in an instant and bled out on the sidewalk, all all this mug can do is ask "What the fuck?"
This is the level of storytelling in this game. You're not going to be staying here to see Huang's character arc.
Further Frustrations
Yes, life goes on and all that. Sure, she was one of the competent ones, but whatever, eh? There's a job to do, again, so run along and do it, would you? And so off we go on more missions for criminals who think their reputation is in tatters because they lost a sword.
If you've played a GTA game before you'll know what kind of missions they are. Go here, shoot them, do that. They're fairly short, at least so far, but will have you venture out through the city to see the sights, from above at least, in both day and night, with both looking quite nice on the PSP.
One mission has us stealing some sports cars, which is a common mission type in GTA, but with the added hotwiring or immobilizer immobilizing minigame, they add another little step of entertainment into the mix. Am I easily distracted by spinning the analogue nub or timing presses of the X button? Probably, but it's different and it's easy enough to speed through and it gives the touchscreen something to do to justify its existence. I'm not complaining, yet, put it that way.
What I will complain about is the drug mechanics or system or economy or whatever word I'm looking for. Your wealth in Chinatown Wars is tied, or at least greatly enhanced, by the buying and selling of drugs from shady street corners and parks and wherever else dealers hang out.
Your PDA/Phone/Email/Pause menu will periodically notify you of a new dealer who specializes in the buying or selling of one or more kinds of drugs, and even the map icon will highlight whether this dealer is someone you're better off buying or selling from.
It doesn't take a genius to work out that you buy stuff cheap and sell it elsewhere for profit, but if the cops catch a whiff of what you're up to, you know what'll happen.
Do you carry a bag of drugs with you wherever you go and risk getting pulled over by the cops, or do you safely stash them away at your safehouse and make drug runs when you're in need of some extra cash? I know what I'm going to do: ignore it completely for as long as possible.
Further Fun Times
After literally making our own Molotov cocktails on the garage forecourt, and then firebombing a nearby establishment that won't pay up its protection money or something along those lines, I decided that I ought to check my emails and see if there are any other faces we can meet in this fine city.
Anyone other than Uncle Kenny will do, but the only guy available is this chucklehead who thinks he's next in line to be the boss of something or other - as you can tell, the story has really engaged me thus far.
He's a street racer, and the thought of racing in this top-down view fills me with dread. Even the tailing mission to steal his rivals car was something I hoped would go smoothly, which it thankfully did, though how you're ever meant to know whether you've held back too far or have drifted too close and have been seen, I've no idea.
Anyway, I like this guys thinking - he assumes his opponent will cheat to win, so we'll cheat too, not by modding our car, but by sabotaging his. It's being picked up from a garage in a few hours, so we've got to get to work quick.
We bring it back to this guys garage - I forget his name, obviously - smash the engine to bits, cut some wires, drop a dead fish into the air filter and we're done. Except now we've got to drive the damn thing back to where we stole it from, and we've gone to town on the engine and it doesn't drive too good anymore. And we're on a time limit.
Maybe we should have messed it up on-site...
Lots of swerving through traffic later, the car is back where it belongs and its owner is in for one nasty surprise when he next gets behind the wheel. As for me, that's an hour of Chinatown Wars, genuinely ending on a bit of a laugh, but not necessarily because of witty dialogue or anything relating to the story - just the idea that we were stupid enough to screw with a car's handling before driving it ourselves.
It's the simple things that get me.
Final Word
From what I've read, Chinatown Wars is full of new ideas, ambitious for the platforms it finds itself on, has its quirks but is generally on the shorter and easier side, and is worth looking at despite it not being a true 3D handheld title like the GTA Stories games released a few years earlier for the PSP.
But I think to compare it is to find reasons to fault it. It's always going to play second fiddle to other titles, even handheld ones, and yet it excels against those same handheld titles for what it offers that is different and fresh, albeit gimmicky perhaps.
The blend of comic book panels and a top-down 3D view of Liberty City give it a style of its own, but voiceless cutscenes with the same music track as your only piece of audio as you read the subtitles screams "this game is limited by hardware" - and yet cars have radio stations, as usual.
I didn't go into Chinatown Wars knowing what to expect, beyond knowing that it was a Nintendo DS game that looked a little cartoony. While I didn't get to play that DS original, the PSP port has gone and shown me an entire GTA game that you can easily pick up and play for a bit, that'll give you the same things you expect from a GTA game, but in a slightly unusual manner.
In short, while I'm in no rush to go back to it, I'll probably end up doing so. I don't care for the characters and don't particularly have any interest in the storyline so far, but there's enough going on with the gameplay that you can hook into that side of things to find a good time instead.
If you glossed over Chinatown Wars because you thought it was dumbed down, you might want to check it out and see whether you were right or not. If it turns out to surprise you, you've got another game to enjoy.
Fun Facts
The Nintendo DS version of the game allows you to use the microphone to literally whistle for a cab.
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, developed by Rockstar Leeds, Rockstar North, first released in 2009.
Version played: PlayStation Portable, 2009, via emulation.