As the name of this mode suggests, Team Mafiya Work has players doing chores for the Russian mob around Liberty City - either in a specific area or across the entire map. Up to 16 people can divide themselves into teams, with the maximum being eight teams of two. Although if you're not a team player there's also a straight 'every man for himself' version of Mafiya Work.

Players start at random locations on the map and must wait for Kenny Petrovic - who crops up in the single player game and also needs whisking to safety in the co-op mode Hangman's Noose - to phone through a contract. Once the job has been received by all players on their cellphones, a marker appears on the radar and it's a race to complete the objective. Contracts all involve familiar GTA mission themes, such as collect, kill, escort, deliver, destroy etc.

Matt: Another of GTA IV's bespoke multiplayer specialties tuned perfectly to the game's 'go there, do that' gameplay. It produced much irresistible team-based chaos. Easily excitable gamers might find it too much - it's edge-of-the-seat stuff all the way. Even waiting for Petrovic to ring through the next contract was tense - the wait usually became a desperate scramble to nab the best vehicles we could find to give us an edge over opponents.

It did take me a little while to warm up to it, however. At first it seemed a little too dependent on luck - whoever was closest to the objective when it appeared on the map often had an unassailable advantage over their rivals. But the more we played, the more we got organised (deciding on a designated driver and navigator to set waypoints was a good starting point) and the whole 'working together' aspect of a good team multiplayer started to shine through, dramatically improving our contract completed ratio in the process.

Of course, even the most well-lubricated team machine is entirely fallible in Grand Theft Auto's reliably unpredictable world, and things were often decided by a reckless last-minute scramble, intense street shootout or being KO'd by an unforeseeable moment of madness. In one instance, the contract dished out by Petrovic was to collect and deliver a package. We were first to the package and - after successfully sending our rivals to the cemetery more than once along the way defending it - we got within spitting distance of the drop-off point, only for a random vehicle to go hurtling into our guy. He goes flying. The package gets dropped. Rivals swoop in to take advantage of our misfortune. A painful defeat.

Mikel and Chris weren't shown this mode. Sucks to be American, apparently.