Grand Theft Auto IV: The Complete Edition - Liberty City Stories

Overview

Grand Theft Auto IV: The Complete Edition is an open-world action game developed by Rockstar North and Rockstar Toronto and published by Rockstar Games. This Steam package launched on March 24, 2020 and bundles the base game with both episodes, "The Lost and Damned" and "The Ballad of Gay Tony" (together known as Episodes from Liberty City).

The setting is Liberty City, a fictional stand-in for New York.

In practice the game feels less like an action spectacle and more like a simulation of city life, especially early on. Niko Bellic arrives from Eastern Europe to stay with his cousin Roman, his phone rings with work, he drives across town to a marker, a shootout or a chase happens, and the money and the relationships shift a little.

That loop is the spine of the game. Travel time is treated as part of the experience rather than something to skip, so the pacing differs from modern fast-travel-first open worlds.

The mobile phone is the hub. Mission calls, invitations from friends, dates, and taxi requests all run through it.

Keeping up friendships unlocks concrete perks — backup gunmen, cars delivered on request, bribes that clear your wanted level — so the side activities are not purely decorative.

Three Protagonists, Three Games in One

The point of the Complete Edition is seeing the same slice of Liberty City from three angles.

Each part has its own save and the timelines overlap. Events that happen at a distance in one story turn out to be yours in another, and those intersections are the real appeal.

Base game → The Lost and Damned → The Ballad of Gay Tony is the natural order, since it means you already know the cast when the episodes cross paths with it.

That said, if the slow early hours of the base game are likely to lose you, start with The Ballad of Gay Tony instead. It hands you the flashy toys immediately.

Features and Systems

Driving is distinctive. Cars pitch and roll under weight transfer far more than in GTA V, and they feel heavy and prone to sliding.

Opinion splits sharply here. Until it clicks you will need to brake much earlier into corners; once it does, each car has a recognisable personality.

Euphoria physics drive the ragdoll behaviour. Someone you shoot may stumble, grab a railing, or get clipped by traffic differently on every attempt, so crashes and chases never replay identically.

Combat is cover-based third-person shooting with blind fire and a lock-on system. It does not play like a modern free-aim shooter.

Aim assist strength is adjustable, so start closer to lock-on and move toward free aim once you are comfortable.

The wanted system uses a search radius. Police draw a circle on your map, and you escape by leaving it and staying unseen.

Reading how the circle re-centres is its own small game and gives chases a tension specific to this entry.

System Requirements

The minimum requirements listed on Steam are:

A Core 2 Duo CPU and a 256MB VRAM GPU put this far below any current machine, and 1.5GB of RAM is not a real constraint today — integrated graphics in a modern laptop clear the bar comfortably.

The 22GB figure covers the base game plus both episodes, so check free space before installing.

The important caveat is that these numbers do not promise smooth performance. The engine dates to 2008 and its draw-distance and shadow work lean heavily on single-thread CPU performance.

Adding GPU power often does little, while a modern CPU can carry the old design to high frame rates. If a powerful graphics card still struggles once you raise settings, that is expected behaviour, not a fault.

View distance and detail distance are the heaviest options, so lower those first.

Note that the data available here contains no recommended-spec listing. Check the Steam store page directly if you need it.

Review Trends

The game has held a strong reputation over a long period. Because the figures move constantly, check the rating panel on this page or the Steam store for current user sentiment.

The recurring themes break down like this.

Commonly praised

• The writing. Its immigrant's-eye view of the city gives it the darkest, most serious tone in the series.
• The density of the city — pedestrian chatter, radio shows, TV programmes, parody websites, all far beyond what the main plot needs.
• Unpredictable physics, which make every crash and chase play out differently.

Commonly criticised

• PC stability and frame rate. Complaints tied to the aging engine remain standard.
• Car weight and handling, which frustrates players coming from GTA V.
• Pacing drags from phone-based friend activities. The episodes trim this; the base game does not.
• Soundtrack changes. Radio playlists are reported to have shifted from the original release as licences expired, so verify current contents if a specific track matters to you.

Language Support

This package supports English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish (Spain). Japanese is not included.

This is the single most important thing to check. GTA IV runs for dozens of hours before you even reach the episodes, and most of that is dialogue.

Beyond cutscenes, characters talk continuously during drives — meaning you sometimes read subtitles while steering. If you are not reasonably comfortable with spoken and written English, the story, which is the whole point of the game, will largely pass you by. For anyone fine with English, this is essentially a dozens-of-hours crime drama with subtitles available throughout, though the slang runs thick.

Who It's For

• Players who want a bleak, patient crime drama rather than a comedic GTA.
• Players who enjoy wandering a city for its own sake and getting distracted en route.
• Players who want one purchase to last a long time, thanks to the three-part structure.
• Players on old or low-power hardware looking for a large game that will actually run.
• Players comfortable playing entirely in English.

Caveats and Who Should Skip It

Skip it if you need Japanese. There is no Japanese support, and for a story-driven game that can be disqualifying.

Skip it if you expect GTA V's pacing. Drives are long, and failed missions can send you back across the same route.

Modern checkpoint granularity and quality-of-life features are not a given here.

Skip it if the handling puts you off. The inertia-heavy cars frustrate many players in the first hours.

Most adjust; some never do. Watching a few minutes of driving footage before buying is a fair test.

Skip it if you have no patience for technical roughness. You are running a 2008 engine as-is; high-refresh or unusual-resolution setups may need extra tweaking.

Skip it if the subject matter is a problem. Violence, drugs, and bigoted dialogue appear throughout and are not softened.

Finally, store listings — bundled contents, languages, soundtrack — do get revised. Confirm the current page text and screenshots before buying, particularly regarding music and episode contents.

Getting Started

Your first hours are small jobs on the east side while helping Roman's taxi business. Rather than rushing the story, keep three things in mind:

1. Build Roman's friendship early. Past a threshold he unlocks free taxi fast travel, which cuts the travel burden substantially.

It is the first perk worth chasing. 2.

Use safehouses immediately. Saving happens in a safehouse bed, so make a habit of stopping by before and after long missions.

3. Revisit aim settings first. Lock-on strength and sensitivity are adjustable; sort them out before combat gets serious.

Both episodes start on separate save slots, so switching away mid-campaign costs you nothing. Taking a break from the base game with The Ballad of Gay Tony is a perfectly reasonable way to play.