Crave

We recently got a chance to check out a new music-making title for the Sony PSP from Rockstar Games (best known as the creators of Grand Theft Auto), called Beaterator. It's not really a game at all, but instead a boiled-down music production suite, combining premade samples and loops with a reasonably robust sequencer, and most importantly, the ability to import your own sounds.

Beaterator is loosely based on a music-mixing Flash app of the same name that Rockstar has hosted on its Web site since 2005.

We're very familiar with PC and Mac applications such as ProTools, Reason, and Logic, used in professional music making, and Beaterator comes off as surprisingly deep and full-featured, even if navigating the sub-menus and pecking out notes and chords with the PSP's controls is probably not the ideal way to create music.

The entire package is "hosted" by an animated version of hip-hop producer Timbaland, who contributed many of the included samples. He leads new users through a basic tutorial, using several premade songs constructed from his own loops, which include drum beats, keyboard pads, bass lines, and more.

A pick-up-and-play Live Play mode lets you just pick samples and play with them, swapping in new ones on the fly--like Rock Band or Guitar Hero, it lets you play around with songs without having to know much about actually making music.

Much more involved are the Studio and Song Crafter modes, which let you edit existing samples, create new ones from scratch (as you would with a MIDI sequencer), and create multitrack arrangements for your own songs.

From our brief time with the package, we were impressed with its depth--from drum machines to programmable synths to an onscreen keyboard for packing out notes and chords, it most reminded us of the popular PC music-making suite called Reason.

The package will be available on September 29 for $39.99, through the PlayStation Network store and on UMD disc, and Rockstar has recently said that versions of both GTA and Beaterator are coming to the iPhone at some point as well.

Gallery: Beaterator

The Ballad of Gay Tony is the second of the two episodic expansion packs for the Xbox 360 version of the Grand Theft Auto IV. The game follows the exploits of Luis Fernando Lopez, a member of the Northwood Dominican Drug Dealers, and bodyguard for Anthony "Gay Tony" Prince.

Rockstar Games will unleash this new adventure in Liberty City on October 29.

Gameloft's successful GTA clone is being followed by the actual GTA.

(Credit: Scott Stein/CNET)

Well, it turns out that not everyone hates Apple's App Store. Gameloft, the ever-present publisher of mobile games worldwide, likes the iPhone and iPod Touch quite a bit. In a recent news release, Gameloft announced that, to date, it has sold more than 6 million games in the App Store, making it its biggest platform.

"Our core focus is digitally distributed games," said Sanette Chao, Director of Public Relations for Gameloft. "Apple is our number one customer and the IPhone OS is our number one platform. I think that alone speaks volumes to the importance of iPhone games to our overall strategy."

Amid concerns over Apple's restrictive handling of App Store certifications and the squeeze that other publishers might be feeling in a landscape of ever-decreasing game prices, this report might come as a breath of fresh air. Indeed, from a consumer standpoint, very little is wrong with the App Store--provided you simply don't want something that Apple isn't willing to provide. In the games department in particular, 10 dollars can buy you more than it can for nearly any other device in game console history. And with developers like Rockstar now getting in the Apple game with an upcoming App Store port of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, clearly there's something in Apple's current economic model that's appealing to even the big guys.

That "something" might be seen as a huge built-in audience. With more than 40 million worldwide owners of the iPhone/iPod Touch platform, the consumer base is gigantic. Putting a title at $5 could lead to a larger profit than a $20 DS game, for instance, that might have limited distribution and availability. Gameloft has 35 games in the App Store at the moment, and while its current game best-sellers are UNO, GTA-clone Gangstar, and Madden rival NFL 2010, it also enjoys evergreen success with Asphalt and Real Soccer, said Chao. This is the advantage that any online store has over physical media--infinite shelf space and the chance for a long tail.

According to Gameloft, the formula for success lies in listening to user feedback, creating low-priced titles, and creating mass-appeal, intuitive games. "Our strategy from the onset has been twofold. First we deliver an aggressive line-up of high quality games and then we adapt in real time to consumer needs," said CEO Michel Guillemot in Gameloft's Tuesday announcement.

The App Store market was recently estimated at $2.5 billion a year, as compared with $60 million for the Android app market. It's no surprise, then, that Rockstar would get in on this action. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars on the Nintendo DS sold 680,000 copies worldwide, and at $35 retail, that amounts to $23.8 million. Assuming a $10 retail price on iTunes, Chinatown Wars would have to sell 2.38 million copies to equal the Nintendo DS performance--a large number, but completely achievable considering the large global base and adult-skewed audience of the iPhone and iPod Touch.

While many things may be askew with the App Store, it's good to remember that a lot of things are still going very well for it.

Or is this still only mostly true for games?

GTA is coming to your iPhone.

(Credit: Rockstar Games)

Rockstar Games, the developers behind the Grand Theft Auto series, announced on Monday that Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars will be coming to Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch this fall.

The developer also announced that Beaterator, an app that allows users to create "world-class beats and songs," will also be made available on the App Store. Like the Chinatown Wars title, Beaterater is slated for availability this fall for an undisclosed price.

Chinatown Wars gives gamers control over Huang Lee, a member of the Triad crime syndicate, who travels to Liberty City to investigate his father's death. iPhone and iPod Touch owners will be able to control Lee as he travels through the streets of Liberty City.

Chinatown Wars is currently available on the Nintendo DS. It's coming to the Sony PlayStation Portable in October. According to Rockstar, it made perfect sense for the handheld title to make its way to Apple's mobile devices.

But since it has been ported from traditional handheld game devices, I asked Rockstar if iPhone owners will see much of a difference between the Nintendo DS or Sony PSP versions and the iPhone version.

Rockstar said there will be some textures that will look low-res, compared to the PSP version, but other than that, the game is exactly the same.

That comes as a surprise, considering that the typical content featured in a Grand Theft Auto game has clashed with Apple's policies against adult-theme material finding its way to into the App Store. Apple denied access to Eucalyptus, an e-book reader application, because it allowed users to find and read the Kama Sutra. Apple even denied access to Ninjawords, a dictionary app, because it contained vulgar words.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars promises a typical GTA experience, complete with the sexual content and vulgar words that have made it such a controversial franchise. Rockstar told me that it had no trouble with Apple's App Store policies and that the game will be made available as is.

Rockstar also said that controlling the on-screen character will be slightly different than what gamers are used to with other handhelds. According to the company, the game will display an on-screen analog stick that users will be able to control with their thumb. The developer wouldn't reveal any more information about the game.

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GTA goes gay for the holidays.

(Credit: Rockstar Games)

This isn't an April Fool's gag. The next installment of Grand Theft Auto is on its way, and like The Lost and Damned and Chinatown Wars, it's still set in the massive world of GTA IV. Rockstar has unleashed a surprise announcement with The Ballad of Gay Tony coming this fall for $19.99, or 1600 Microsoft Points.

The character in focus this time is Luis Lopez, an assistant to Gay Tony, or Tony Prince, Liberty City's premier nightclub entrepreneur. The glitz-addled world could be a little dose of Vice City-style mayhem. According to Rockstar Games founder Sam Houser, expect a "focus on high-end night life." And, according to the press release, expect "uncertainty about who is real and who is fake in a world in which everyone has a price."

Also announced was the release of both The Lost and Damned and Gay Tony episodes in a single standalone disc-based game called Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City. At $39.99, it will cost the same as both DLC (downloadable content) episodes, plus it will have a physical disc and box, and will not require GTA IV to dig into its seedy pleasures.

Together, those almost add up to a GTA IV sequel. Perhaps this really is the future of game publishing: build a world once and populate it many times over. On a side note, we wonder if this bit of pre-E3 info is a sign of E309 to come. Will the lousy economy equal more DLC and less standalone content? We shall see soon enough.

Triple homicide in your pocket.

(Credit: GameSpot)

The controversial Grand Theft Auto series infiltrates the Nintendo DS handheld gaming platform Tuesday, March 17, in the form of Chinatown Wars. While the game is still set inside the fictitious town of Liberty City, the storyline deals with the Chinatown section of it and a Hong Kong transplant who will serve as the game's protagonist.

Chinatown Wars features an older GTA game play style as you'll be viewing the world from a top-down perspective. This viewing mode was how GTA was originally played before it made the jump to 3D with Grand Theft Auto III on PlayStation 2. You can also expect a change in art style as the game adopts a refreshing cel-shaded sort of look, most likely to lessen the workload on the DS hardware. Expect classic GTA mission-based action mixed up with some inventive ways of using the DS touch screen.

Also turning heads are the drug-dealing minigames that are found inside Chinatown Wars, which harken back to the days of the text and math-based "Dope wars" game that made its way across the Internet.

So what do you think? Can GTA work on the Nintendo portable, or will Chinatown Wars sleep with the fishes? Be sure to check out some screenshots of the game in action.

The Lost gang displays a clear disregard for local helmet laws.

(Credit: Rockstar Games)

We've spent the better part of the Presidents' Day weekend playing through The Lost and Damned, the first episodic downloadable content for Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto IV. With all three major living room game consoles now more or less permanently hooked up to broadband Internet connections, it makes perfect sense that game companies would want to bypass the heavy fixed costs of pressing discs, putting them on trucks, and stocking them in retail stores, in favor of selling downloadable content directly to the end user.

While the concept isn't new (there are hundreds of mission packs, add-ons, and even full games available from the PlayStation Network store, Xbox Live, and Nintendo's Virtual Console store), this $20 game-within-a-game is easily the most high-profile attempt at mainstreaming downloadable episodic video game content to date.

Instead of adding new locations or extending the original game's storyline, this new content package uses the existing maps and assets from GTAIV to tell a new story, with new characters. This time, a biker gang called The Lost gets involved with all sorts of GTA-like mischief, from feuding with rival gangs to dangerous in-fighting between the members.

Despite new faces and voiceovers, and a handful of new vehicles, weapons, and music, it still looks and plays pretty much like Grand Theft Auto IV, with a handful of tweaks. The motorcycles, which are your primary form of transport, have gotten a nice revamp, making them much easier to control. A major gripe from the original game--the lack of in-mission checkpoints--has at least been partially addressed. This time, if you fail a mission, you can restart right before the action kicks off, instead of having to drag yourself through all the exposition and driving it took to set up that part of the story.

The new game revisits many of GTAIV's key locations (and you're free to roam wherever you want between missions), and familiar characters such as Niko Bellic drop in for cameo appearances. Our main complaint is that behind the new faces and names, there's little that feels different from the original GTAIV campaign. If anything, the highly telegraphed storyline and Sopranos-like dialogue of the biker gang actually seems like a step back from Niko Bellic's relatively subtle (by comparison) story arc.

While one could easily spend 40 or more hours playing through Grand Theft Auto IV, the Lost and Damned expansion should take about 10 to 15 hours to play through, which is still longer than many full-priced retail games.

The Lost and Damned is available for the Xbox 360, starting February 17 for 1,600 Microsoft Points (or about $20). A copy of Grand Theft Auto IV is required to play.

Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned

Over at our sister site, Gamespot, Wednesday, the eagle-eyed Guy Cocker noticed that Rockstar Games has officially announced its mega-hit, Grand Theft Auto IV, is coming to the PC.

Originally available for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, the game, which had sold more than 8.5 million copies through early June, will be available on PCs--though not Macs, apparently--on November 18 in North America and on November 21 in Europe.

This is a big move for Rockstar Games because it opens up GTA IV to an even bigger audience than could already play it. And that likely means many more millions of units sold to players who feel they simply don't want to put down the cash for a next-gen video game console like the Xbox or the PS3. And just in time for the holidays.

Further, it means that PC gamers, who have been able to play previous versions of the Grand Theft Auto franchise, will be left behind their console-owning friends no longer. All of which means more bins full of cash for Rockstar and its Take-Two owners.

According to Rockstar, the PC version of the game will feature an exclusive multi-player version. And one wonders if that could lead some players who already have the game for the Xbox 360 or PS3 to buy it for the PC as well. Again, more riches for the publisher.

Uh-oh.

For all the champagne toasts that are no doubt going on over at Take-Two Interactive and its subsidiary Rockstar Games over the grand launch day of Grand Theft Auto IV, there's a bit of a dark cloud brewing.

According to a post on CNET News.com sister site GameSpot, there's a brouhaha afoot in GTA IV forums all over the Internet because of some players' complaints that the game is freezing up on them.

As GameSpot's Brendan Sinclair points out, it was only a month ago that another one of Rockstar's games, Bully had freezing-up problems. Now, with reports of crashes with GTA IV, mostly on the PlayStation 3, but also on the Xbox 360, one has to wonder if perhaps there's someone in Rockstar's QA department that's not doing their job.

Other recent hit games, of course, have also had quality problems. You might recall that some players of Guitar Hero III had problems with their guitar controllers.

So one thing that will certainly help Take-Two and Rockstar get through this relatively unscathed--assuming the reports of GTA IV freezing up are real--is if they react quickly and solve the problem and reach out to their users. If they don't, it won't look good.