GTA: Chinatown Wars PSP Review

With customary style and sensitivity, Rockstar has retooled menus, the HUD and the game’s roster of hand-drawn 2D mini-games to compliment the PSP’s visual estate and OS. Equipment, objective, map and Ammu-nation menus are laid out laterally in a nod to the XMB, and mini-games no longer take up the entire screen but cut in across the right-hand third, integrating seamlessly with the main action. Mini-game timers have been relaxed, perhaps in recognition that analogue controls are less responsive than a touch pad.

Grenades are the best way to ease rush hour congestion.

The original’s addictive Dope Wars inspired strategy sub-game has been fleshed out, and there’s a slew of new missions. Examples include a simple search and destroy affair, with Huang driving a pick-up truck while charming acquaintance Zhou Ming points a chaingun turret at parties of drug dealers. Elsewhere, you’ll conduct a diversionary rampage down the freeway in a Rhino tank, and protect an unwary TV journalist from the stars of her latest drug documentary.

Another long, lonely night in Liberty City.

On the audio side, there are new radio stations to spin out two additional hours of tracks. Rockstar’s commitment to music has always been one of the developer’s gilded attributes, and it’s good to see that commitment at work even on a relatively minor project.

The game’s announcement for PSP was somewhat dwarfed (in this writer’s estimation, anyway) by news of an iPhone Chinatown Wars, Rockstar’s first jaunt – alongside Beaterator – into Apple’s highly lucrative backyard. However, the PSP’s traditional but less constricted control setup and higher storage threshold lead to a more playable, content-rich experience than either the DS or (in all probability) the App Store release. If you’re one of the many GTA vets who turned down Huang’s offer first time round, 20th October’s the time to seal the deal.