iPhone game of the day: Gangstar

Game: Gangstar West Coast Hustle
Price: £2.99/$4.99
Size: 175MB
Buy it now from the iTunes Store

There's already a GTA game on iPhone in the shape of the awesome Chinatown Wars. But that's not proper GTA, is it? We want to be down in the streets, behind our character, not flying along like some morally-reprehensible blue tit. Enter Gangstar - a true 3D free-roaming sandbox game. You can steal cars, beat up passers-by, and of course run dubious errands for lowlifes, all the while packing a pistol... or better.

Graphically, iPhone is struggling just a little to keep everything running smoothly, but while it isn't as detailed as a PS2 GTA game, it's certainly no slouch. The draw distance is decent enough, the cars all have working suspension and the character models are actually quite detailed. At this price, it's hard to complain about the game's slight shortcomings. Instead, we should rejoice that this kind of game can be done on iPhone - and still keep the fun factor intact.


Above: Even the colour scheme is reminiscent of Vice City. Incidentally, those touch controls work nicely

28 Jul, 2010

Justin Towell

Justin was a GamesRadar staffer for 10 years but is now a freelancer, musician and videographer. He's big on retro, Sega and racing games (especially retro Sega racing games) and currently also writes for Play Magazine, Traxion.gg, PC Gamer and TopTenReviews, as well as running his own YouTube channel. Having learned to love all platforms equally after Sega left the hardware industry (sniff), his favourite games include Christmas NiGHTS into Dreams, Zelda BotW, Sea of Thieves, Sega Rally Championship and Treasure Island Dizzy.