Because all the new stuff in GTA IV can be a lot to digest, here are some tips for dealing with all the intricacies of the game without wasting valuable time. I'll be covering some weapons that you won't get straight away, but that's about as spoilerific as you'll get. And hey, it's GTA! What gameplay could you possibly spoil now that you are playing the game?


Cabs!
Cabs are awesome. You can use them anytime during the game, unless you have to drive more than 1 person to a location or when you are wanted. Usually you start in a car with those missions, or you are asked to get a 4-door vehicle. Taking a cab to a location usually takes around 10 gameminutes (or 15-20 seconds). Driving to the other side of town can take longer than 1h30 minutes (gametime), so taking a cab to a date is the fastest way to arrive without getting negative points for arriving too late.

Yes, dates respond to your car. But if you take them to say, their favorite hangout and a place to eat, they are happy enough to give you around +7/+14 relationship points anyway. One thing to remember is that you can’t whistle for a cab when you are drunk, so make sure you take a cab to a midtown bar where there are enough cars. Once you stand still in front of one car, there will often be a cab in the row of cars behind it. Throw your drunk ass in front of a car if you need to.

Don’t forget to use Roman’s cab service later on, if you are a cheapskate. Not that you need to spare the money; you’ll never run out of money so spend as much as you want. If you do call a free cab, remember that it can take up to 20 seconds before you can enter it…

A downside to the cab system is that you’ll use it so much that you hardly ever drive yourself anymore… Remember to listen to the date/hangout conversations in the cab before you skip to your location, sometimes people have something to say. Although I don’t think it matters in terms of relationships points whether you skip it or not.

Another downside is that cabs are a fast way to plowing through the game, but you're probably better off with a PS3 when it works. There's a lot of loading between cab skips, and playing it off a memory card wasn't terrible but I'd rather have installed it instead :)


Dates and upping your relationship
Remember the time of the day! All dates and friends have a time where they sleep. If you call someone too early, you get -1 point most of the time. Reload where needed. Also, some things are unavailable for dates even if they are on the map, like Heli rides. Look at the minimap first, identify the things that are highlighted, like a Burger Shot or a Strip club. One date had a Strip club on the minimap, but I figured I’d take her to a classy restaurant instead. She said the food was ok… while she loved the Burger Shot that was on the minimap. Maybe she liked a Strip Club too, but I never tried it. Just use the minimap references to identify high yielding entertainments.

When going to a show, don’t skip the show. Your date will comment on why they left so early and it probably translates into nega points. Use it as a toilet break instead, if you’ve already seen the show. The same holds true for strip clubs. Don’t enter it and immediately leave, your friend will get pissed.

Bowling doesn’t seem to distinguish a lot between half-games and full games, I think. So you might as well just do a half game. Darts is the easiest thing to do, but not a lot of people like it. For pool: look at how your cue is lined up before you start adjusting it. I found out at the end of the game that it automatically lines up your perfect shot for you, so don’t waste any time playing actual pool. Just shoot and get the hell out of there. Unless you want to play pool, of course.

Boat trips and heli rides are fun and make the game look amazing at sunset. But they also take an easy 3 hours of your time. Remember what you are starting if you have multiple dates lined up for the day/night!

Clothes. Use the different stores in the game to buy pretty much any outfit. NPC’s don’t really seem to distinguish between clothes bought in the same store, unless you wear them twice in a row to two dates. Even then, not everyone cares about it and you get enough points from whatever you take them too.

Always take a friend out for food! It’s easy to do, takes no time at all and you get extra points even if they say they want to go home. The same holds true for dates. Just ignore what they say and stuff that food down their throats.

If your friend is at 100% Like and less than 100% respect: fuck them. They might call, but just ignore them. There is no added benefit to keeping a friend happy once he is at 100%. Just let them drop a bit to 80/90, and take them to a food/event date again. If you ignore your friend for a long time, he'll drop to 60%-ish and become a pain, so don't ignore them for too long!

Finally, you can date women through the internet. There is one date (a nurse) that can help if you make her happy enough. And there is a lawyer (Lawchick or something) that can help as well. If you fuck up the first date though, you can’t call them again or try it again. Make sure you select the right option when you bring your first date home too: you don’t want to dump them on the spot with a quick press of B, especially since the game autosaves after completing the date.

Weapons
M4 for life. All weapons kinda work how you’d expect them, ie: shotguns up close, SMG at midrange etc. But usually you want one weapon for all ranges anyway. Once you get the assault rifle, use it. Always buy maximum ammo when you can, since you’ll never find enough to resupply you to the max in any mission.

Beware the Molotov cocktail! It might sound like a good idea to slowly push open the door, and throw a molotov into the room. It is, unless your arm is against the door and you throw it against the door… It’s very frustrating when this happens at the 3rd stage of a mission, so take care when you throw it. Make sure you take care with grenades too. You can’t blind-throw them if you don’t lock on or aim at something: you’ll just drop them where you stand. Which can be a bit of a pain in early-game. Or erm: don’t be stupid.

You can ZOOM IN! After locking on or aiming, click RS to zoom in a bit. I only found this out after completing the final mission, so it’s not necessary to use but it’s recommended. The assault rifle and auto-aim pretty much fix this problem, unless enemies are hard to hit behind cover. I always rushed forward and shot them, but I guess you could try a headshot with zooming in instead..


Cars
Yes, all cars in Broker pretty much suck. Stick to soccer mom cars if handling is an issue. They often have a decent top speed, and handle easier than the muscle cars or other piece of shit cars. I haven’t read Samit’s super extensive guide to driving, so I’m gonna leave driving skills out of this cblog. Suffice to say that mastering the right analogue trigger is a must.

If you do find a good car, drop it off at the safehouse that is most central to where your missions are located. Sometimes it helps to have a good car in a mission, but it sucks if you have to drive them through the whole city every time.

When you store cars though, you tend to ignore them in the end in favor of taking a cab to the mission. It’s faster isn’t it? It’s always nice to have a backup though.

If you have to shoot, knock out the window before the mission starts. You don’t want to have to knock out the window to fire when your opponent is right in front of you. Always try to aim for the tires first, it makes catching up with cars in a chase that much easier. Speaking of chases: if you are having trouble with destroying a car while in pursuit, just don’t. They always stop at some point, or brake for something stupid, which gives you ample opportunity to rape everyone. Just make sure you don’t have to leave the car intact, or if the car contains something you have to get back, you’ll have to wait till they exit the car before you can get that thing.


Missions and health
Some missions require you to follow a car, then shoot all the enemies (innovative!). When arriving, you can always take a cab to a weapons store or a clucking bell to restock. Because you’re never going to find a hot dog stand when you need to :P

If you screw up a mission too many times, remember that you can reload and take a cab to the mission again. It tends to save you more time than having to rebuy armor and wasted ammo, and you save some money you won’t need in the future. Hospital bills can add up if you die a lot of times though, especially in the first half of the game.

Ignore the cover feature if you can. Sometimes it can come in handy when there is only one entrance and a ton of enemies inside. But since you can only aim/shoot for as long as you fire, it tends to become a drag. Move back from the door instead, and kill everyone with the assault rifle. If there are a lot of enemies, you can lock on, shoot automatic for 4 rounds, move the left analogue stick to the next enemy, shoot him with 4 rounds and repeat. This way you won’t lose accuracy too much, and you’ll hit anyone who is in front of you with a couple of rounds. Making it easier to pick off injured and non-firing opponents.

If there are stairs: jump up the stairs! It’s the fastest way to travel. You can drop down quite a bit without losing health, and 10 foot falls usually only cost you 5% health anyway. Play around with the heights until you are familiar enough to take the fastest vertical route.

If you are taking cover behind a wall or pillar without using covering: for the love of god don’t jump! Niko can get stuck inside the pillar/wall and leave you pressing all buttons for a minute until he somehow lets go. The same holds true for boats and docks. If you fall in the water, grab the boat on the waterside, not the dockside. You don’t’ want to grab the boat only to get stuck between the boat and the dock, unable to get inside the boat. Things like this always happen at the end of missions, so beware.

Finally, if you are having trouble with a chase mission and you really don’t’ want to listen to the chase conversation for the 4th time: don’t shoot up the car/boat/whatever you have to chase. If you can, great. If you can’t, it might be scripted. There are a couple of really hard missions (I’m not gonna say which or when/where) where it’s almost impossible to pass it unless you follow someone/something to a scripted event. If it looks too hard to be possible, it probably is. Not impossible, but you know, you could get tired with retrying a 20 minute missions 5 times.

You won’t lose a target unless he is like 1,5x the minimap away from you, or if you moved off the scripted chase path. Sometimes you just have to follow a chase car’s path instead of choosing your own. If you move off the path, you could easily lose him within seconds while you could stay behind him on his path and wait for almost a minute. The chase car/bike/thing/person will slow down for you, stuff will happen in-game and all that. Ignore freedom in favor of finishing the mission when it’s needed.


Cops
The cops are really easy to escape with 1-2 stars. It might look hard in the beginning, but if you are wanted: look on your map. Try to find long stretches of roads, preferably freeways. If you drive at full speed away from the cops, you’re home free. If you encounter a cop on the way or on the freeway, just drive past them. They never catch up with you and if your car is fast enough (not a Golf cart!!) you won’t have any trouble.

A different story is with 3 stars and over. The police helicopter will track you where it can, and it has a huge radius. Try to stick to tunnels and drive below freeways. Another tactic is to stick inside the major skyscraper part of Manhattan: the choppers appear to have difficulty tracking you there. But the traffic can be a pain too, so there is a tradeoff. Whatever you do: don’t drive into the direction of the minimap where the land ends. Jumping in the water and swimming a mile out can work with 2 stars, but not with a chopper on your ass. And no, you can’t fire an RPG from the water.

If you have 4 stars or higher: good luck. Escaping is possible. but also a waste of time with the advent of autosaves. Shooting up cops is fun, trying to escape them is meh. Focus on shooting them instead of running away, it's basically free to shoot whatever you want whenever you want.

Try not to get busted. Yeah I know, duhhhhh. But if you suicide, you keep all your weapons. So just suicide or reload, meng!

Fin
That's it for now, if you have any questions I'll be happy to add some stuff here.

Also, apparently IGN took this video down because it was "too much":