Nintendo Power: GTA Chinatown Wars is cel-shaded, isometric, M-rated crime drama
by James Ransom-Wiley 
on Sep 19th 2008 10:25AM
... With "tasteful" minigames. Indeed,
Nintendo Power has published the first comprehensive preview of
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, according to details
provided by NeoGAF poster botticus. The relayed information (in handy bullet-point format), describes
Chinatown Wars as a "true
GTA game," which is to say, a Mature-themed sandbox game concerned with all things criminal (just like the
survey said). The DS technology limits gameplay to an isometric camera angle with cel-shaded visuals, though the load times, draw distance and frame rate are reportedly sound; and weather effects, along with a day and night cycle are in tact. The preview claims there are plenty of on-screen pedestrians and cars -- speaking of: there are multiple radio stations, mostly juiced with instrumental tunes. All in all, "800,000 lines of hand-optimized source code" are packed into the tiny cart.
What else?
Chinatown Wars is said to return players to a sizeable portion of Liberty City (wild guess: Chinatown?), though the map has been altered from the console version. Missions will also be shortened and can be easily restarted upon failure. The D-pad is used for aiming, while the R-button activates auto-targeting; and there's "subtle" auto-steering built into the driving controls. The touch pad will be used for the aforementioned minigames, in addition to navigating the PDA-like UI, which includes email, contacts, the map, a music player, GPS, and stat-tracking (stats can be Wi-Fied to the
Social Club). Now, how about some,
uh ... scans? (Or better: screens! C'mon Rockstar, with this game
scheduled to release in mere months, throw us a friggin' bone or two!)
Update: Gamekyo's got some scans right
here. [Thanks Fernando!]
[Via
GoNintendo; thanks, Frank]
