With all the media madness over the past few days, I bet you have heard about GTA IV, the latest installment of Rockstar’s franchise. From the gaming magazines to the mainstream media and news agencies, everybody is eyeing the release of the new game. But does GTA IV really deserve the hype?

GTA IV is not fundamentally different from the previous titles. The story revolves once more around a character who lives according to the principle "you can't escape your life, no matter how hard you try."

Therefore, shooting sprees, violence and prostitutes, the darkest aspects of society, are always encountered in any of the Grand Theft Auto games.

The ones who hope that GTA will offer them the opportunity to play the role of an outlaw who makes his own rules and has no principles will certainly not be disappointed.

As in the other GTA titles, in GTA IV things work simply: you get a phone call and you must go on a mission. Obviously, while trying to satisfy some people, you'll succeed in upsetting others, but, what the hell, that's life…

But GTA IV is much more than that. The notoriety that GTA IV is currently enjoying is boosted by another element. Following several years in which the gaming industry used good graphics and image quality to attract players, GTA IV is reviving narration, focusing on the story and its main character.

Immersing a player into the game's fiction does not only assume creating fascinating backgrounds, transforming a virtual environment into one that is as close as possible to reality (even a fictional type of reality), but also forcing him to understand what goes on with the story, why he should care about what happens in the game.

Rockstar realized defying limits was not good enough, and neither was being outrageous (like Manhunt 2), as long as the mind and feelings of the player are not involved on the game.

Niko Bellic is neither a natural born killer, a sadist or a reckless criminal, nor a puppet (as happens in other GTA titles). He has a story, he is a “real” character.

Rockstar discovered that GTA IV will gain fame due to the story and its details, and that is why Niko Bellic is more than a phantom guided by the player's gamepad. He can talk on the phone, navigate the Internet, visit striptease bars…he is as human as a game character can be. He lives in a city amongst other people and, as in real life, no one in the game is pure good or pure evil.

The big merit for Rockstar is that they succeeded in demonstrating that the story, the details and realism are the elements that sell a game, no matter how good the graphics or textures are.

So I hope Rockstar sells many million copies, and the others learn a lesson from GTA IV's success.