Last night was a big GTA night. I got home, did the washing up, then sat down and played through to bedtime, apart from a quick break to get some food. So now I can give some real first impressions. Which basically boil down to WHOA! MAN! BEST GAME EVER! GUFFAW! KABOOM! PEW PEW! WHOA!

So, what did I do last night? Let’s try to remember.

I got out of bed and watched some TV. Saw a whole episode of Republican Space Rangers, which was puerile, obvious, yet still somehow very, very funny. Classic GTA humour, then. Watched a bit of poker, but then got antsy for some action.

Did some missions, including the infamous “brick through the window” mission. I’m pleased to say I did it first time by, you know, picking up the brick shown on the radar and then throwing it through the window.

I finally got a gun, The first gun I got I found in a staff only area of a strip club, but before using it I got given another gun.

Gunplay is much better than previous GTAs. Killing hits are dealt with amazingly, enabling me to create scenes that look like they came out of The Wire. Gunning down a fleeing drug dealer in the middle of an empty street is going to stay with me. It looked amazing and felt a little… odd. There was little sense of elation, more grim satisfaction. People can still take point blank hits to the chest and hardly flinch, though. The killing hits hurt and shots to limbs provoke a reaction, but other shots just seem to get soaked up at times.

I’m not sure whether I should turn auto-aim off or not. I find myself using the manual aim so much that I might just get rid of the automatic option altogether.

(And talking of changing settings, I put the brightness and contrast up by a few notches. Makes the game a whole lot better. I can see again!)

Got to the first mission where you get to make a choice at the end. After a long race through the streets and over rooftops I was asked whether I wanted to kill my target or let him live. I think I made the right one, but I guess only time will tell.

My current favourite car is the Dukes car. It’s basically an old Dodge Charger, hence the name. It’s loud, looks good and is very exciting to drive, once you get used to it. I’m a fan.

Took Michelle on a couple of dates. Went to the cabaret and then later took her out to a small backstreet bar. Tried my luck and was rewarded with the Warm Coffee achievement.

I’ve done some amazing stunts in cars. Flips and rolls and jumps, oh my! One particular series of jumps and rolls had my wife staring open-mouthed. She then said, “That is the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.” And she sounded like she meant it.

I think that so far I’ve only shot one innocent civilian. She’d run me over and I’d only recently got a gun, so I decided to kill her. Didn’t get a wanted rating, despite the presence of several witnesses, but did get a sense of vague disquiet. I’m sure I’ll get over it.

Got drunk a few times. It’s a really good effect and very funny, stumbling around, falling over and failing to use my mobile phone. I got terribly drunk on a date with Michelle and decided to hail a cab to get home. (It’s a immediate one-star wanted rating if a cop car sees you driving around when drunk.) Cabs are excellent. I’ve been using them a lot. It’s a risk-free way to get around and reasonably cheap. I haven’t skipped a cab ride yet, but I have told the cab driver to hurry up. Drunkenness is, I think, my favourite thing about GTA IV right now.

Saw my first chain reaction of car explosions. I clipped a taxi in my car at full speed. My car conked out and wouldn’t restart. When I got out I saw that the taxi I’d hit was on fire. The driver was writhing around on the floor on fire. Oops. Then a tire exploded. Then the whole taxi exploded. People ran away screaming. And sometimes on fire. More cars exploded. More people ran, more people caught fire. And then a car too close to me exploded and I woke up at the hospital. Again. Classic GTA mayhem, but bigger and better. Obviously, the graphics looked better, but the fire works better, the explosions work better and the animation on the civilians caught up in it all was amazing. One lady on fire practically fell over her car door, scrabbled around, managed to right herself and then got a few paces before collapsing. I took the money she dropped. It is GTA, after all.

All good fun, anyway. I was only slightly late to bed. I would have been on time, but on the drive back to the safe house Roman called my mobile and asked me if I wanted to go out to a strip club. How could I refuse? I picked him up, took him out and then drove him home. A few minor police chases along the way, but it was reasonably incident free.

If Sony hadn’t already used it, “This is Living” would be a good tag line for this game.