I'll just get this up front: I enormously enjoyed Grand Theft Auto IV. But here's the thing: It's kind of hard to explain why.
There's no single thing to point to -- no must-see scene, no gotta-do moment of gameplay, no deliriously fun weapon. No, the game's pleasures come in weird, subtle, unexpected moments.
Let me give you an example. At one point, I was having a typically thuggish day: I'd killed a few drug dealers with a semiautomatic, and while trying to flee, whoops -- I accidentally rear-ended a cop car. Then it was a car chase, all wailing sirens and shrieking pedestrians diving out of the way, before totaling my SUV in a brutal collision and escaping on foot. A total Hillary Clinton nightmare, in other words...
