This means there will be a least three different editions of the game. While each version allows you the same access to the full retail version of Grand Theft Auto V, the “Standard Edition” brings just that. Each of the three editions offer a pre-order bonus of an “Atomic Blimp” in-game vehicle for “iconic and leisurely” travel through Los Santos.

The Special Edition brings with it a SteelBook with artwork including custom and metallic treatments – strange printing techniques only used in presentations above and beyond the normal call of duty for an art book. A BluePrint map that shows a unique view of Los Santos and Blaine County is included in the package at 21.5 x 26.75 inches large.

The Special Edition will also add special weapons added to the players inventory available for free – melee Hammer, Bullpup Shotgun, and Pistol .50. In-game bonuses also include a “Special Ability Boost” which makes your special ability bar jump 25% faster, Stunt Plane Trials, Bonus outfits, tattoos, and aesthetic differentiators of all kinds.

The Collector’s Edition includes everything that’s in the Special Edition, adding a Security Deposit Bag with Logo Key, 9FIFTY Snapback Cap, and a set of “classic” Grand Theft Auto characters for customization and use in the Grand Theft Auto Character Creation System.

The Collector’s Edition also adds a garage where users are able to store custom vehicles. Single-player mode has this garage stocked with a 1930′s style Hotknife hotrod as well as a CarbonRS sports bike. The online version will include a “high-end Khamelion electric car.”

And of course the whole lot comes in a fancy collectable outer box with foil-embossed Grand Theft Auto V logo with matte, scuff-resistant film lamination. This Collector’s Edition will run you a cool $149.99 USD while the Special Edition will cost $79.99, and the normal edition will cost you right around $59.99 – choose your fate!

SOURCE: Take-Two

With the first and all-encompassing trailer, Rockstar makes use of YouTube’s ability to jump back and forth through videos and to and from the other three videos so that the viewer will be able to pick and choose their experience before the game is released to the market. The option is also given to watch the three videos all the way through – this one long video is also a combination of the three videos, one on top of the other.

Needless to say, these videos are all NSFW – Not Safe For Work in the least bit (depending where you work, of course).

The first of three presentations surrounds Michael, a fellow who has a family and a home life that’s not especially fantastic. He’s having a mid-life crisis and his wife has cheated on him. Also he’s prone to destroying vehicles and massive amounts of violence. Of course. His experience is outlined by the song Radio Gaga as performed by Queen.

Franklin is up next, his storyline existing in the gang-banger universe, full of gunshots and police traps, trophy guard dogs and what very well may be some drug dealing. Franklin appears to be as dissatisfied with his life situation as Michael, only Franklin wants to get out of the violent world while Michael wants to get deeper.

Finally there’s the character Trevor. He’s a drug dealer who is a very, very bad man. He works with Michael and Frankin, it seems, and it would appear that his satisfaction with the world is based entirely on very bad things. The gamer can expect the cinematics for Trevor to be very NC-17, without a doubt.

The game Grand Theft Auto V will be coming to stores on September 17th, 2013, and will be available for multiple platforms. At the moment it would appear that the PlayStation 4 and next-generation Xbox will not be supported (at least at the outset), but may be in the future. Of course those consoles wont be out for a while anyway – no worries!

Playlists are included for all the major Grand Theft Auto titles, including Episodes and Stories installments as well. In all, Grand Theft Auto IV, Episodes from Liberty City, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Grand Theft Auto III, Liberty City Stories, and Chinatown Wars are included in the package.

69 albums in total are available, and they’re listed as the radio stations featured in each of the games, including the classic ones like Flashback 95.6 and Lips 106 to induce a little nostalgia during your music-listening sessions. They should no doubt make you want to boot up that Xbox and start playing the game for the heck of it.

Prices for the albums vary depending on which one you get. Some radio stations only include a few songs, and you grab those for only a few dollars for the album, but more filled-out albums will cost as much as $20. However, you can stream the music for free over Spotify, but if you prefer the ad-free approach, you can stream all the music you want for just $10 per month.

Grand Theft Auto V‘s box art features the three main characters that you’ll see in the game: Franklin, Michael, and Trevor. Franklin is the one holding the handgun at the bottom, Trevor is holding a sniper rifle on the right side, and Michael is riding the jet ski. This provides a good look at the men who you’ll be controlling throughout the game.

However, there’s a familiar-looking device in the hands of the woman off to the left. What could that be? Oh, of course, it’s an iPhone 4/4S. It wouldn’t be Grand Theft Auto if they didn’t sneak in popular items with the logos torn off. Other than, there appears to be what is possibly an Audi in the lower-right corner, suggesting that GTAV will include new cars, which isn’t a surprise.

Grand Theft Auto has made a name for itself over the last decade or so, and the box art to each and every game is instantly recognizable, which means that Rockstar must be doing something right. They have created their own brand with Grand Theft Auto, and while they’ve released a good amount of installments over the years, the series has yet to let up any steam.

GTA: LCS takes place 3 years before Grand Theft Auto III. Players will notice a nostalgic feel to the game, as it essentially has many similarities. However, there will be some significant changes in the scenery to the game. For example, the construction site located in Fort Staunton in GTA III will be a little “Italy District” in LCS instead. Also similar to GTA III, you will be unable to swim in LCS. Jumping into the water will kill you.

GTA: VCS features some major changes, as well as several, similar aspects from its counterpart. The hand-to-hand combat system has received a major upgrade, where players are now able to grapple/throw enemies. There is a new “empire-building” feature in the game that allows players to operate businesses on property obtained from enemy gang members. One of the classic elements included in the game is the option to take on side missions.

While both games did have an online multiplayer feature on the PlayStation Portable, it’s still up in the air whether or not those features will be available on the PlayStation 3. These games should serve as a great distraction until Grand Theft Auto V comes out. GTA V is expected to come out on September 17th of this year. Fans have been waiting anxiously to get their hands on the game, and Rockstar attempts to curb their cravings by releasing a plethora of screenshots.

[via Rockstar]

Grand Theft Auto 5 is set to be released on September 17th of this year. It was expected to be released this Spring, however, Rockstar decided to delay the launch in order to polish the game more. GTA V is one of its most intense games yet, featuring the largest in-game world that’s said to be bigger than Red Dead Redemption, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, and Grand Theft Auto IV’s worlds combined.

The game will also feature a whole bunch of new vehicles that you can steal and drive. There will be a whole bunch of hobbies you can take part of, such as tennis, golfing, scuba diving and more. Many of the franchise’s core aspects have improved too, including shooting (which is said to have evolved in “a long way. There will be a multiplayer mode that will let you form/join a crew of up to 5 people to complete various group tasks for experience points.

Grand Theft Auto V will be released on both the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360. There’s no word yet on whether or not the game will be released for the Nintendo Wii U or the PC. There is a petition that many PC gamers are signing in order to convince Rockstar to release GTA V onto the PC. The petition has already reached 163,000+ signatures. Stay tuned for more GTA V updates (and screenshots). You can also check out the rest of today’s screenshots in the gallery below.

[via Rockstar]

Rockstar didn’t give a specific reason for the delay other than “to allow additional development time.” The development team apologized for the delay, but said that the extra time needed to polish up the game will be well worth the time for those eagerly waiting. The company says that GTAV “is a massively ambitious and complex game and it simply needs a little more polish to be of the standard we and, more importantly, you require.”

Rockstar has been teasing us a good amount throughout these past few months, releasing new screenshots of the game what seems like every other day. They give us a good look at what to expect in the new game, and we’re even told that Grand Theft Auto V will feature Rockstar’s largest in-game world that they’ve ever developed.

The game will feature three protagonists, and it takes place in Los Santos, one of the three cities featured in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. The upcoming game should hopefully blow all other past installments out of the water. We really like GTAIV, but we’re hoping for even more with GTAV, considering it will have the largest in-game world to date.

In an interview with io9, Darabont says that Rockstar “threatened to sue the shit out of [him], TNT, every company that actually ever worked in Hollywood. And they have the billions of dollars to back it up, apparently.” Because of that, Darabont says that he’s changing the title of his new TV show from LA Noir to Lost Angels. The show is set in 1947 Los Angeles, and it will star Jon Bernthal.

While the previous name, setting, and timeframe of the new TV series seems dangerously close to Rockstar’s LA Noire video game, Darabont says that the TV show is based on a novel titled “LA Noir,” and has nothing to do with Rockstar’s game. However, while Darabont claims that he was threatened with a lawsuit, Take-Two said that nothing of the sort happened.

Speaking with Joystiq, the game publishing company claims that they only approached TNT in order to “express concern over confusion between the properties,” but say that they have never approached Darabont. The actions that led Darabont to change the name of the show are completely unrelated, according to Take-Two.

[via Joystiq]

The listing quietly popped up on Amazon’s UK, French, and German websites sometime over the weekend. However, none of the listings display the release date of the game, nor the price that you’ll be able to buy it at, although the French listing has a price of €49,99, while the German listing has it for €59,99.

Rockstar has only confirmed Grand Theft Auto V for release on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, but has also suggested that a release for PC and the Wii U are being considered. Granted, all previous Grand Theft Auto installments have been released on PC before, but not until well after the console versions came out. The last major game in the series, Grand Theft Auto IV, released on PC in December 2008, which was eight months after its release on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Again, Rockstar has not officially announced a PC version of the upcoming game, and an Amazon listing is obviously not hard proof that the PC version will even exist, but if we base our predictions on past Grand Theft Auto releases, we can bet that a PC version of Grand Theft Auto V is very likely to arrive on store shelves, but maybe not right away.

[via VideoGamer]

We heard that Windows Blue may still use the controversial Metro UI design, while Mark Cuban spilled the beans on his gadget collection in an AMA on Reddit. Samsung is seeking a ban on Ericsson products here in the US, and the Panasonic P-02E 1080p Android smartphone showed up at the FCC. The expensive yacht that was built for Steve Jobs has been released from the impound lot, and we learned that Netflix will be introducing new social features next year.

Samsung will apparently be showing off a Smart TV UI refresh at CES 2013, and Google has extended free domestic Gmail calls in the US and Canada for another year. Rockstar released a collection of new Grand Theft Auto V screenshots, and we heard that the Samsung Galaxy S III might soon be heading to T-Mobile with LTE functionality. NVIDIA TegraZone landed on Windows RT today, and we heard how loud it is on the International Space Station thanks a new audio clip containing the station’s ambient noise.

Apple has a patent on file for a new kind of curved glass, while Microsoft announced that it will soon be opening six new store locations. The POP charger has been given approval by Apple, which means the project is a go once again, and Google said that it plans to take 90% of Microsoft Office’s audience for itself. Toyota will be paying out $1.1 billion in settlements for cases relating to the floor mat issues with the 2010 Lexus RX, and iPad mini yield problems are starting to look better. Netflix’s Christmas Eve outage was blamed on problems with Amazon’s Web Services, and finally tonight we have a review of the Adorama Flashpoint 500C LED camera light for you to have a look at. That does it for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, we hope you enjoy the rest of your night folks!

The shots are purposefully nondescript, but they do show off a variety of things that will apparently be in the game. These include swimming with sharks, rottwielers riding shotgun in really nice-looking cars, and mini submarines. There’s also a shot featuring a commercial airplane flying alongside a fighter jet with a blimp doing its own thing in the background, so maybe we’ll get the chance to fly these aircraft in the game? One can only hope.

The final shot of the group centers on three men who look like they’re up to no good. Who they are is a mystery, so for now we’re stuck waiting until Rockstar shares more details on their significance (if there is any at all). This is only the latest in a long line of Grand Theft Auto V screenshots that come without any form of description, so fans should be pros at figuring out clues by now.

With a current release window of Q2 2013, Grand Theft Auto V is primed to become one of the biggest games of the year. Depending on what else launches in 2013, Grand Theft Auto V could even become the biggest game of the year, but we have a feeling that the inevitable Call of Duty release will ultimately steal its thunder. Still, its release date is getting ever-closer, so fans of the series have plenty to be excited about.

[via Rockstar]

Modern Combat 4 costs $6.99, which may seem like a steep price, but you can’t really go wrong with one of the best first-person shooters on any mobile platform. Plus, it works on the iPhone, iPod Touch, and the iPad. Also if you didn’t already know, the game comes with multiplayer, complete with leaderboards and over 20,000 weapon arrangements.

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City will cost you $4.99, the same price as Grand Theft Auto III when it launched not too long ago. As aforementioned, the Android version seems to be MIA. The Google Play store link shows up in Google search results, but clicking on it will lead to a 404. It’ll probably only be a matter of time before it’s fixed, so we’ll update you once it goes live in the Google Play store.

UPDATE: Rockstar has issued a statement on the missing Android version of the game:

“We’re aware that some users have attempted to download Vice City: 10th Anniversary Edition from the Google Play Store and have experienced validation errors. Just to be clear: the game is not available for Android devices just yet, and if you’re seeing it listed on the Store then this is an error, and you shouldn’t attempt to download it. We’ll keep you up to date and let you know as soon as the game is live and available to purchase.”

While Rockstar originally said that the game would be released on iOS and Android at the same time, it looks like that’s no longer the case.

If you’ve played GTA: Vice City before, the mobile version will be very familiar to you, since it’s essentially a port of the console and PC version, but with a few few enhancements implemented, including updated character models and lighting effects, as well as more precise firing and targeting options with weapons.

Download Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City for iOS now.

Of course, the screenshots will look very familiar to you if you’ve already played through the game before, since it’s pretty much exactly the same game, except for the few enhancements. Rockstar says that on top of improved graphics, they’ve implemented more precise firing and targeting options with weapons.

While Vice City may not have the high-definition visuals that we’ve come to expect from recent games like Infinity Blade and Real Racing, it still doesn’t look like it’s a decade old. It looks more like only a couple years old, but sooner or later, we hope that Rockstar continues to release its older titles onto mobile platforms — we certainly wouldn’t mind.

Obviously, we’ll have to play the game before we can make a judgement on exactly how much better the enhancements are, but for a game that’s 10 years old, we have to say that we’re impressed with the screenshots so far. Hopefully Rockstar will tease us again tomorrow with a few more screenies, but we wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t hear from them until launch day.

Zelnick obviously brought up the elephant in the room, the popular Call of Duty series, which has seen a yearly release for the past eight years, dating back to the launch of Call of Duty 2 in 2005. Zelnick says that Activision “obviously views the world differently.” However, Take-Two’s view is that “if you want intellectual properties to be permanent, then you run the risk in that circumstance of having consumers fall out of love with that franchise.”

The success of the GTA series is a result of Take-Two’s avoidance of yearly releases, which Zelnick says keeps the series “special.” While franchises like Call of Duty get rebooted each year (and see greater success each time), Zelnick noted the danger of this type of business model, and says that Take-Two is not willing to take those kinds of risks with the GTA series.

The Grand Theft Auto series has shipped 125 million copies since its initial launch in 1997, and this is up 11 million copies since September 2011 when Take-Two announced 114 million copies. According to one of the publisher’s representatives, Grand Theft Auto IV shipped 25 million copies, representing 20% of all GTA copies shipped.

[via Gamespot]

Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2012 turned out to be the best ones ever for Amazon’s Kindle family of devices, and Evernote Clearly has added text-to-speech for its premium members, which is a pretty awesome new feature if you ask us. Gmail has added support for 10GB attachments so long as those attachments are stored in your Google Drive account, and Outlook.com was able to boast 25 million users today, with Microsoft telling us that an Android app is on the way.

We heard today that Foxconn might be manufacturing Microsoft’s rumored Surface phone, and Apple reassured everyone today that the new iMac is still on track to launch later this month (November 30 to be exact, which is right around the corner). Cyber Monday sales topped a whopping $2 billion this year, and we learned that Nintendo TVii will be launching in Japan on December 8, which leads us to believe that it won’t be long before the service is available in the US and Europe.

HP and Nomadix have settled their patent lawsuit, while Nintendo launched new nostalgia-fueled DLC for New Super Mario Bros. 2. Fans are petitioning Rockstar to release Grand Theft Auto V on PC, and indie hit Super Hexagon is now available on Steam. Microsoft might be opening its first retail store in Europe as early as next year, the NYPD is building a database of calls made with stolen phones, and Rdio has been updated on iOS and Android with an entirely new UI.

Finally tonight, we have a couple of reviews for you to check out. Vincent Nguyen delivered his review of the new Jawbone UP earlier today, while Chris Burns takes on Hamilton’s Great Adventure THD for some mobile gaming goodness. That does it for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, enjoy the rest of your night folks!

Currently at the time of this writing, the petition has almost 57,000 signatures, and 100,000 signatures is the target goal. However, there’s no guarantee that the petition will even work. It wasn’t even Rockstar’s idea to start the petition, so even if 100,000 signatures are obtained, Rockstar could easily ignore it and pass on the idea of releasing GTA V for PC.

However, while the GTA series has seen PC versions for all major releases in the past, Rockstar might be headed in a different direction this time around. For what it’s worth, the studio didn’t release Red Dead Redemption to the PC platform, so it’s possible they could be having the same thoughts with GTA V.

Rockstar has said that GTA V won’t target next-generation consoles, which is why they’re sticking with the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, while skipping the Wii U (although that’s being discussed as a possibility, along with a PC version). Rockstar usually releases PC ports a few months after the console launch, so it’s still possible that we could see a PC version of the game hit sometime during the summer, but don’t hold your breath just yet.

[via Joystiq]

Android users can now duplicate their Grand Theft Auto experience in their own cars using the GTA Radio app. Of course, we mean listening to the different radio stations, not causing mayhem while driving down your local main street. The best part is, the app can work in the background while you use other apps so that you’re always listening to GTA Radio while you browse Facebook and Twitter.

GTA Radio consists of most of the stations in all of the Grand Theft Auto titles as early as Grand Theft Auto III. This includes GTA III, GTA Vice City, GTA Liberty City Stories, GTA Vice City Stories, GTA San Andreas, and GTA IV. A few stations are missing from GTA IV, but the team is working on adding all the stations eventually in future updates.

The only caveat is that the app is only available on Android, and there’s no word on whether or not it will come to iOS anytime soon. Our guess is that it’s a licensing issue that Rockstar is dealing with, but we’re not sure if they’ll be able to get past it or not. All we can do is cross our fingers and hope for an iOS version at some point. In the meantime, you can download the Android version for free and start enjoying some classic GTA radio.

The team at Rockstar is proud to present Vice City for the following Apple devices: iPad, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, and iPod touch 4th and 5th gen. At the moment they’ve not got the iPad mini listed, but it’d be quite the stretch to think that the iPad 2 were supported but the iPad mini weren’t. Those of you working with Android might want to check the specific list here before dropping some cash.

Android Phones: Motorola Razr, Razr Maxx, Razr Maxx HD, Motorola Atrix, Motorola Photon, Motorola Droid Bionic, HTC Rezound, HTC One X, HTC One S, HTC Evo 3D, HTC Sensation, HTC Droid Incredible 2, Samsung Galaxy Nexus, Samsung Nexus S, Samsung Galaxy Note 1 & 2, Samsung S2, Samsung Galaxy R, Sony Xperia Play, Sony Xperia S, P, T & TL, Sony Walkman Z Series Media Player, Samsung Galaxy S2, Samsung Galaxy S3, Google Nexus 4
 
Android Tablets: Acer Iconia, Asus Eee Pad Transformer, Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime, LG Optimus Pad, Medion Lifetab, Motorola Xoom, Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 / 10.1, Samsung Galaxy Tab 2, Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1, Sony Tablet S, Sony Tablet P, Toshiba Thrive, HTC Flyer, Google Nexus 7, Google Nexus 10

This list is comprehensive to a point – these are just the devices that the development team behind the game has tested and confirmed. If you’ve got a hot device looking to work with the game, I’m sure they’ll be happy to hear that you’ve tested it out for yourself and made it work fine.

This version of the game will have native-resolution graphics and enhancements unique to the mobile universe, specifically tuned to Android and iOS. Updated character models will be busting out with lighting effects updated throughout the game, while firing your pistol has become more precise and your control layout is completely customizable by you. RockStar Games also plans on boosting their warehouse with a collection of 10th anniversary collectables just in time for the holiday season as well – grab em!

[via RockStar]

Currently, Grand Theft Auto V is planned to only release on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, but Rockstar’s Dan Houser says that versions for PC and Wii U are “up for consideration”. Houser mentions that Rockstar is “a third-party publisher”, meaning that they can do whatever they want “wherever there’s the appropriate business opportunity and chance to find a market.”

It seems Rockstar is confident in the Wii U, and Nintendo of America boss Reggie Fils-Aime even told MTV in an interview that he had received positive comments from Rockstar about the Wii U gaming console. Plus, Fils-Aime seems excited at the prospect of having GTA V available on the Wii U. He says that Nintendo wants to “create an environment where teams like Rockstar can bring their very best content” to the Wii U platform.

Previously, Rockstar released several games on Nintendo’s last-generation Wii console. Bully, Manhunt 2, and Table Tennis were just some of the games that Rockstar released on the Wii. However, the developer has yet to announce any Wii U projects. Hopefully Grand Theft Auto V will be their first.

[via IGN]

We learned today that Call of Duty: Black Ops II sold 1 million copies at GameStop alone on launch day – news that shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone – and Rockstar delivered the second trailer for Grand Theft Auto V after weeks of new screenshots and news for the highly anticipated game. RIM CEO Thorsten Heins is confident that BlackBerry 10 will be a big hit when it arrives early next year, while the HTC Windows Phone 8X and Nokia Lumia 820 landed at T-Mobile today.

Steve Wozniak expressed his fear that Microsoft is doing more to innovate than Apple is, while we learned that text messaging is showing a decline for the first time ever. The HTC DLX – better known by the name of HTC DROID DNA here in the United States – will be launching in China on December 6, while AT&T launched its 4G LTE network in a number of new markets today. The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 has been added to the Queen’s royal collection, and sadly, the final issue of Nintendo Power has been finished, which means that the magazine’s offices have gone dark.

We heard the very sad news that Texas Instruments plans to lay off 1,700 workers in an attempt to save some cash, while Google added one-click app installs to Google Plus feeds today. One father went to the trouble of changing the text in The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker to show his daughter that it isn’t always boys who get to be the hero, some EA Origin members are having issues with hijacked accounts, and the Facebook Pages feed is ready for some time in the spotlight.

Finally tonight, we have a couple of different reviews coming your way, both from Chris Burns. First up we’ve got a review of Roger Dean’s Dragons Dream for iOS, followed by a review of the HTC Windows Phone 8X from T-Mobile. That does it for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, enjoy the rest of your night everyone!

This trailer shows three men trying to get by in the world, each of them with their own terrible problems to deal with. You’ll see three different perspectives on the everyday situations of mob-connected or otherwise gang violence-toting regular Joe kind of fellows, complete with pistols under the covers. A lovely rendition of “Skeletons in my Closet” rings true as these three wild beasts take it to the streets and either try to keep the game going or stop it entirely – good luck to you, the player.

You’ll see all manner of vehicles, mind you, including helicopters, motorbikes, trains, and boats. The three of these guys appear to start their journeys off in completely different directions, but by the end of the video you’ll find that they’ve got to team up to take on whatever evil they’ve gotten themselves into. Expect not only to be acting as an anti-hero here – expect some hero action as well.

This game is set to bring on the largest live maps in the history of gaming and will be showing up with play that’s more high-definition than the folks at RockStar have ever brought on before. Also see if you can spot the Apple computer in the trailer – it’s hot!

GTAV.net has posted up a convenient bullet list of many of the new features we might see in the upcoming Rockstar title, and they also included a gallery of about 60 un-watermarked screenshots from the game — all of which give us a good look of GTAV‘s environment and different characters, as well as the different weapons and vehicles.

Grand Theft Auto V will feature the largest in-game world of any Rockstar game. The developer says that Grand Theft Auto V‘s Los Santos world will be bigger than Red Dead Redemption, GTA: San Andreas, and Grand Theft Auto IV combined. We’re pretty shocked by that, and we can’t even begin to imagine how many gigabytes the game will take up, not to mention possible loading times.

GTAV will include three protagonists, all of which can be switched to at any point in the game to take control over. The game doesn’t yet have a solid release date yet, but it’s confirmed by Rockstar that it will release sometime this upcoming spring on Xbox 360 and PS3 (sorry, PC gamers).

The screenshot is of what appears to be one of the game’s protagonists riding a personal watercraft and firing a submachine gun back at what we think are police officers trying to catch him. The personal watercraft has “Los Santos Beach” and “Lifeguard” inscribed on it, which makes us believe that the watercraft was stolen (obviously).

The magazine also provides us with a few details and some background information about the protagonist. The magazine explains that “the protagonist is an East Coast gangster” who moved to Los Santos (Rockstar‘s take on Los Angeles) for a fresh, new start. “But, as in The Godfather III – just as he thought he was out, they pulled him back in.”

The screenshot has since been removed, proving that we now bear an important leaked piece of Grand Theft Auto V information. While gamers were able to operate watercrafts in past Grand Theft Auto installments, maybe we’ll see more interactive features dealing with that front in the upcoming sequel.

[via Digital Spy]

Hulu has launched its new Hulu Kids service for paying subscribers, while the Samsung Galaxy Express and the MiFi Liberate are headed for AT&T. The creators of Expendable Rearmed have been working with NVIDIA to bring the classic Dreamcast game to Android, and we heard that Foxconn may be thinking about expanding into the US. Google began teasing its Niantic Project earlier today, and speaking of Google, it launched Free Zone today as well, a new program that will attempt to give feature phone owners access to basic Google services.

Hitachi has revealed its lineup of HDTVs and Smart TVs for fall 2012, and scientists have spotted a “Super Earth” in the habitable zone of a star that’s 42 light years away. The HTC One S has popped up at T-Mobile with a price tag of zero dollars, and AT&T is willing to shave $100 off the price of a new tablet so long as you’re willing to sign a two-year data agreement. Flomio has taken to Kickstarter to raise funding for its FloJack NFC reader for iOS, and Mimo has introduced a new touch screen monitor that’s compatible with OS X.

We learned when Star Wars: The Old Republic will be going free-to-play, and GameFly is offering BioShock as a free download for a limited time, so if you haven’t played it yet, have at it. AT&T has backtracked somewhat on its FaceTime restrictions, and the Humble Bundle for Android 4 has launched with six games that are all worth checking out. Finally tonight, Chris Burns gives us his review of Evernote 5 for iOS, so be sure to have a look at that. That’s all for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, enjoy the rest of your night folks!

That’s exciting enough, but then there’s also the news that Los Santos – the in-game city found in Grand Theft Auto V – is bigger than the worlds in Red Dead Redemption, GTA: San Andreas and Grand Theft Auto IV combined. In other words, expect one massive in-game world to explore once Grand Theft Auto V arrives next spring. We can also count on the same dynamic missions like the ones found in Red Dead Redemption, so it sounds like there’ll be a lot to do in Los Santos.

The three characters’ names are Michael, Franklin, and Trevor. Michael seems to be the one who was narrating the early trailers we saw for Grand Theft Auto V – a former criminal who is looking to distance himself from his past but invariably gets pulled back into the criminal underworld anyway. Then we have Trevor, who is a drug addict with an anger problem. He’s an old friend of Michael’s, so it isn’t much of a surprise that the two are teaming up in Grand Theft Auto V. Finally we have the young hustler named Franklin, who has aspirations of making a name for himself. Obviously, youth and a lust for power aren’t exactly a winning combination, so he seems like he’ll fit in just fine with our two other unstable protagonists.

Each character will have a different set of skills (we’re assuming it’s like Trine only a little grittier), and they’ll each have a different part to play during in-game missions. Fans of Grand Theft Auto V and Episodes From Liberty City will be pleased to hear that they may see some familiar faces in Grand Theft Auto V, but don’t expect any characters from the PlayStation 2 GTA titles to show up in GTA V. There also appears to be some kind of multiplayer mode (co-op perhaps?), but it looks like Rockstar will be saving those details for a later date.

You’ll have to read the latest issue of Game Informer to get all of the details, but there are some of the biggest talking points from the 18-page write-up. What do you think? Are you excited for Grand Theft Auto V, or do you need to hear more information before you’ll jump on the Grand Theft Auto V bandwagon?

The photo viewer is small enough to fit on a keychain, and is branded with a “FlyUS” logo – likely one of the businesses found in Grand Theft Auto V. The viewfinder’s five slides show a handful of different locations, including Zancudo River, Del Perro Pier, Grapeseed, Vespucci Canals, and finally, Vinewood Hills. We have to say, this is one of handiest pre-order bonuses we’ve ever come across.

GTAGaming originally posted the first slides and the image of the viewfinder, while over at Joystiq, a poster for Grand Theft Auto V is being shown off. Those who pre-order the game starting on November 5 will get both a poster and the viewfinder, though it’s difficult to tell if the poster over at Joystiq is an actual pre-order bonus or if it’s promotional material. In any case, it’s certainly doing its part in getting us excited for Grand Theft Auto V.

Earlier this week, Rockstar confirmed that Grand Theft Auto V will be arriving in spring 2013. The studio didn’t give a specific release date, and we’re thinking that it will keep the exact launch date a secret until we’re into 2013. Keep it tuned here to SlashGear, and we’ll let you know if any new details leak out!

[via Official PlayStation Magazine]

All we’ve seen of Grand Theft Auto V so far is just a bunch of screenshots, with no other details to go along with them. UK retailer GAME tweeted out to its followers that Grand Theft Auto V was now available for pre-order and posted a photo of some promotional artwork of the game. GTAV isn’t officially available for pre-order just yet (or so Rockstar hasn’t given the thumbs up yet), so GAME ended up deleting the tweet, but their pre-order page is still live with a release date “TBC-2013.”

UPDATE: Rockstar Games has officially announced Spring 2013 as the release window for Grand Theft Auto V on its website.

However, come December, we’ll surely find out more info about the game. The December issue of Game Informer will have Grand Theft Auto V on the front cover and it will be the issue’s main story for the month. The issue will no doubt have even more screenshots, and it also might be the time where the developer announces pre-orders for the game.

The leaked promo materials don’t just show us the release window, but they also show off some artwork that we haven’t seen yet, such as a guy sitting on a four-wheeler as well as a couple of guys holding machine guns with gas masks on their faces. Could it be that we may see more weapons and possibly chemical warfare component in the GTAV? We’ll have to wait and find out.

[via IGN]

On top of new GTA mobile games, Rockstar will be releasing a ton of other content, as well as collectible items from the game developer’s online store. They’ll be releasing never-before-seen artwork, as well as an anniversary trailer that will highlight a handful of iconic scenes and music from the game.

Rockstar will also sell a “limited run” of various collectible items through the Rockstar Warehouse, and they’ll be giving away a ton of free stuff as well. It’s not said what anniversary items they’ll be selling exactly, but it will most likely include T-shirts, hats, mugs, and other traditional memorabilia that you could think of.

The upcoming version of Vice City on iOS and Android is said to “bring the full experience to mobile devices, featuring native high-resolution graphics and several enhancements unique to the iOS and Android platforms.” We’re sure it won’t be anything short from what we saw in GTA III on iOS and Android, so if you’ve been looking forward to playing the Miami-esque version of GTA on your smartphone, it’s finally coming.

If you’ve been waiting for either the DROID RAZR HD or the RAZR MAXX HD, good news: you’ll be able to pick them up from Verizon in just one short week. The Samsung Galaxy S III Mini was officially unveiled today, though its specs aren’t much to write home about, and we learned that the sales ban on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus has been lifted. Google boss Eric Schmidt expects Android to hit 1 billion activations within the next year, and today Sprint confirmed that it has been in buyout talks with SoftBank.

Apple has released a new iPod ad called “Bounce,” while Nokia was busy delivering prices for its Lumia 920 and 820 accessories in the UK. Apple was awarded an interesting new patent today, and Verizon says that it will keep its 2G/3G service active until at least 2021. Today Acer revealed both the new M5 and V5 lines of Windows 8 notebooks, and we heard that at one point, Nokia was planning to bring an N9 MeeGo tablet to Verizon.

Facebook is looking to improve its apps with stricter Open Graphs policies, and Gearbox announced a new DLC pack for good ol’ Borderlands 2 today. Ubisoft delivered a new trailer showing off the weapons in Assassin’s Creed III, while a new compilation called the Rockstar Games Collection: Edition 1 was announced. Anonymous has apparently gone to war with Facebook, bringing down the social network across Europe today, but thankfully it seems that things are slowly coming back online. Finally tonight, we go hands-on with both the Huawei Ascend D Quad XL and SHADOWGUN: DEADZONE‘s new multiplayer beta, while Chris Burns tells us why the Galaxy S III Mini represents a missed opportunity for Samsung. That does it for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, go out and enjoy the rest of your night everyone!

Specifically speaking, Red Dead Redemption, Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City, Midnight Club: Los Angeles Complete Edition, and LA Noire are all included in this bundle. Obviously, two of the games included in this compilation are compilations themselves – Episodes from Liberty City is a collection of two Grand Theft Auto IV expansions, The Ballad of Gay Tony and The Lost and the Damned, while the Midnight Club Complete Edition includes the base game and all of the DLC cars and locations that have been released since the game launched.

It’s a quality collection, to be sure, but chances are you’ve already played some of the games included in it. If you somehow haven’t, then we have to urge you to go pick up this bundle when it launches on November 6 for Xbox 360 and PS3. Even though it costs full retail price – $59.99 – the games included in it are some of the best made this generation (we’re particularly fond of Red Dead Redemption).

Aside from prepping this collection for release, Rockstar is currently working on the long-awaited Grand Theft Auto V. We’ve been given screenshots to drool over and even a trailer here and there, but for the most part, Grand Theft Auto V is still being kept under wraps. We’re anxiously waiting for new details on Grand Theft Auto V, but in the meantime, this new Rockstar Games Collection: Edition 1 should do something to take our minds off the fact that the studio and publisher Take-Two are really, really good at building anticipation.

This verdict comes on the same day that Tim Cook wraps up his first year as Apple CEO, and elsewhere in the world, a similar lawsuit between Apple and Samsung ended with both companies facing bans in South Korea. Ouch. After a bit of a shake up at the OnLive headquarters, things seem to have calmed down a bit, and Steve Perlman will be staying on as OnLive CEO. LG has teased an incoming smartphone with an S4 quad-core processor, and Google’s legendary I’m Feeling Lucky button has been given a pretty major update. It isn’t the same I’m Feeling Lucky button it once was, of course, but we think it’ll begin to grow on you after awhile.

The presidential campaigns will soon begin receiving donations through text messages, and the Nikon D600 full-frame DSLR camera may be getting a release in September. Speaking of cameras, beleaguered Kodak has come up with a new way to raise some quick cash after patent auctions left something to be desired. The much-rumored iPad Mini has apparently popped up in some photos for a pre-fab case, and it seems that Samsung has a new smartphone called the Galaxy Stellar coming to Verizon, which is all well and good, but Samsung actually has yet to announce the phone or release a list of specs.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 has beaten the iPad when it comes to profit margins, and for the third time this week, Rockstar has released a new batch of Grand Theft Auto V screenshots. Astronomers have discovered a pair of new spiral galaxies that have a lot in common with our own, and it would appear that Amazon has leaked its tablet plans through a new advertisement. Wrapping up the news tonight, Facebook is having its developers use the Facebook app for Android in order to get them motivated to fix it, or at least that’s what the rumors say.

As is usually the case here at SlashGear, we didn’t just have news for you today, as Chris Burns provides a review of SuperTooth DISCO 2 for you to check out. Have a good weekend everyone!

This time around, however, there are four screenshots instead of just three. Pretty awesome, right? Monday’s screenshot gave us a look at transportation, Wednesday’s offered a glimpse at leisure activities, but today it’s all business baby. As with the screenshots from earlier in the week, these ones don’t give much away, but you should be used to nondescript teases by now if you’re a fan of Rockstar.

In the images, we have a police officer chasing what appears to be a person stealing a car from the back of a semi truck, a small plane flying over a rather scenic river, the necessary and inevitable car chase (complete with an extremely low-flying helicopter) and finally, in what might just be the most detailed GTA V screenshot yet, we have an image of a man aiming his gun at a police helicopter that has him in the spotlight. This brings the total number of Grand Theft Auto V screenshots to 10 for the week, though as stated above, we still don’t know all that much about the game itself.

Rockstar has obviously planned it that way, wanting us to guess at what we’ll be getting with Grand Theft Auto V as it slow lets new details trickle out. Sadly, it looks like this is the end of the new Grand Theft Auto V media for a while, but Rockstar does say that it will be back in a few weeks with more. Whatever Rockstar will be revealing next, we’ll have it for you right here at SlashGear, so be sure to keep checking back.

Just like the images from Monday, these ones don’t give too much away. One of them shows a pair of chaps riding dirtbikes through a mountain path. Another screenshot shows a pair of people playing tennis at an estate we could never hope to own. The third one is the most telling, as it confirms that parachuting will be making a return in GTA V. That’s something to get excited about, right?

Truthfully, the entire game is something to get excited about, and Rockstar is doing a masterful job with marketing. The blog post revealing these images, for instance, comes without any accompanying text, and the post is simply titled “Leisure.” Looking at the comments section, it appears that Rockstar’s marketing strategy is working, as many fans have burning questions that the studio probably isn’t going to answer.

It looks like we’ll be getting even more screenshots before the week is out too – taking a look at Grand Theft Auto V‘s official website, we can see that there are three screenshots that haven’t been revealed yet. We imagine this next trio of screenshots will be released in a similar fashion to the others, and if we were to hazard a guess, we’d say they’re coming on Friday. Whenever Rockstar unleashes these remaining screenshots, we’ll have them for you right here at SlashGear, so stay tuned.

All three are meant to give us a glimpse at the different modes of transportation found in Grand Theft Auto V. Obviously, cars will feature prominently in GTA V, as the title and previous installments give that detail away. There’s also an image of someone riding a bike, and then we come to an image of what looks suspiciously like a fighter plane. If you look closely, you can see a suited man in the cockpit of the plane.

That man is suspected by some to be the game’s protagonist – the suited man from the first GTA V trailer and also presumably the man who was narrating. We still don’t know much about him yet, and for that matter, we don’t know much about the game in general either. Rockstar is keeping its cards close to its chest with this one, at least for the time being – once that highly-anticipated release date is announced, we imagine a ton of Grand Theft Auto V media will begin flying out of the studio.

For now though, we’ll have to wait as Rockstar slowly reveals new details one-by-one. The studio says that more of those details are coming later on this week, and we have a feeling this new information will be related to these screenshots. Stay tuned, and be sure to have a look at our story timeline below for more on Grand Theft Auto V!

When asked how the game was coming along, Rockstar responded, “We are very busy working on the game! Everything is going well, but the game is a huge project. We should have more information and some new assets for you soon.” Rockstar’s games often encounter long stretches of time before new information is released, something one user questioned the company about.

Rockstar responded with the following: “We are sorry if you find this frustrating, but please understand, we don’t do this because we ‘don’t care about our fans’ ‘don’t respect our fans’ ‘hate GTA fans etc’ – precisely the opposite! We do it because we want to make sure we only release 100 per cent correct information, and because we want to keep plenty back for the actual game release so there are still lots of surprises when you play it.” The company finished by saying that there wasn’t much more to show than the trailer that was released back in November.

Grand Theft Auto V is set in the fictional Los Santos area of San Andreas. The game will take cues from modern day Los Angeles, and while not much information surrounding the game has been released, Rockstar has confirmed that GTA5 will feature a “Crews” multiplayer implementation. That feature is also found in Max Payne 3, with Crews created in one game able to be carried across to the other.

[via NowGamer]

This game is out on the TegraZone – and therefore the Google Play app store for a modest $2.99, inexpensive enough to be part of your nightly run to the ice cream shop if you just put off picking up the banana split for one night. This game is certainly ready to be worth having just an ice cream cone instead as it brings on a brand new set of touch controls, analog camera control, Rockstar Social Club Integration, and a fully customizable set Gamepad-ready controls as well.

You’ll find the graphics to actually be a bit enhanced over the original PlayStation experience you might be used to – don’t worry, that’s normal. Make sure your Tegra 3-toting device is amped up to 11 and that you’re off “power-save” mode if you have one: this ain’t Angry Birds. You’ll find this game and its gameplay to be extremely similar to Grand Theft Auto III – which makes a whole lot of sense given the creators of both are of the same family. The graphics, again, are comparable as well.

This game has been made ready to work best on your NVIDIA Tegra 3-toting device, that means working with an HTC One X or any one of the several tablets that’ve been released (or are about to be released) here in the year 2012. It’s all about quad-core here with a shooter that’s the only game we’ve seen thus far with shooting abilities tied to graphics nearly as good as we’ve seen on the Shadowgun series. What you’ll get here is the PlayStation game in all its glory – and that includes the graphics.

Have a peek at the game for yourself on the Google Play app store through the NVIDIA TegraZone starting tonight (immediately if not soon) – and let us know what you think!

While it’s not extremely fair to compare a massive PC role-playing game release like Diablo III to a third-person shooter like Max Payne 3, you’d have to be living under a rock not to have seen the media blast-out between these two beasts over the past few weeks. What we’re seeing here is Rockstar Games going up against Blizzard Entertainment, creators of the rest of the massively popular Diablo series and the most popular MMORPG of all time, World of Warcraft.

Pre-order totals for the Xbox 360 version of Max Payne 3 came in at 158,551 new customers while the PlayStation 3 version brought in 123,046 players of its own. Combined, 281,597 Max Payne 3 players don’t have anything on the 823,992 Diablo III pre-order players taking on the forces of evil today. If you’re in either camp, you’re likely not going to be reading this any way you look at it, as online and offline games are burning up consoles and gaming PCs starting earlier today across the nation and the planet.

Happy gaming, folks, and stay tuned for release numbers which should be racked up by either production group by the end of the week. Expect the best!

Rockstar, of course, is best known for its Grand Theft Auto titles, which are engineered to create controversy. But the publisher has a history of creating other, epic games that don’t get as much attention but are often praised just as highly from critics. Max Payne is one of those franchises. It’s still a bloody and violent game, but in this series that content is portrayed much more in context with the storyline.

The game has an emphasis on guiding players through a captivating adventure, such that the violence is not gratuitous; it’s necessary and pivotal to keep players’ attention. So, in other words, Max Payne 3 is anticipated by gamers who just like a good game. It’s proof that Rockstar doesn’t have to be controversial. Of course it will be violent, but it won’t be terrible, awful, “hide the children” violence.

If you’ve ever played Grand Theft Auto III before, you know how polarizing it can be for the people watching you bash, shoot, and crash your way through missions all the live-long day. A person either loves or hates the fact that this game is born of violence and ushered in a whole genre of similar games in which the whole world was open to you and your mischief. Here with the A5X processor in the new iPad, there’s nothing holding you back from busting skulls non-stop for hours on end.

NOTE: Also check our our [Full iPad 3rd Gen Review] for more iPad action!

Of course this game also exists for the iPhone, but at such a small scale you’ll never get the full length and breadth of the meal of destruction you’re set to aim at the earth in this push of the classic death festival to the modern mobile world. Play this game on the iPad 2 or the new Retina display-having iPad, and have the most awesome time of your life – and get the red flatbed truck, it always has the best tunes.

This game can be found today on the [iTunes App Store for $4.99] and worth every penny. This game has been updated at the end of last month and is due for an upgrade soon we expect, more than likely the update including some added elements we’ve seen in the NVIDIA Tegra 3 optimized version for Android. We’ve played it on the ASUS Transformer Prime and would have to say: it looks pretty darn good there also.

BONUS: Have a peek at the new iPad vs Transformer Prime in a Grand Theft Auto III split-screen crash a thon: exclusively on SlashGear’s Facebook page!

There’s nothing quite like the Big Lebowski when it comes to comedy films – and when it comes to action shooters, there’s really nothing exactly like Max Payne. This latest installment has a slightly drunk but always ready for a good adventure Max ready to take on a mission from a millionaire who appears to have lost his trophy wife to kidnappers. If that doesn’t ring a bell, perhaps you’d better skip to 1:03 and check out the sipping of the White Russian.

From there, take a peek at these comparisons when you’re watching the trailer in its entirety. Note also that this game will be coming on May 15th to Xbox 360 and PS3 then two weeks later to PC machines. Also there’s a pre-order for a special edition out now available until the 2nd of April. Also note at the end of the trailer how they say the trailer was made entirely from in-game footage: we must assume this means from cinematics, but you never know!