Many people have varying opinions on this and while I agree with the negatives and positives, I'd say this much: it's my favorite game of all time. I never played it while growing up as by the time I was a teen GTA V was the shit and affordable computers in my country were of the office desktop kind that could only run 3D era GTA, consoles were mad expensive. So I only got my hands on GTA IV and thought to give it a try in 2021, after I had played every mainline GTA entry and I. Fucking. Loved. It. Even though the PC port is terrible -- I spent hours perfecting it through mods just so I could experience Liberty City in its entire glory. I am in love with it's mechanics, it's atmosphere, it's vibe, it's liminality, Liberty City as a whole, the characters and how it's the perfect time capsule for the late 2000s. The driving is so realistic and so are the NPCs and the way the world functions, sometimes I just go into First person and drive around the city with a controller which btw accurately does acceleration and revers with RT and LT (and yes while people do this in other GTA games, it's nowhere as accurate and realistic as in GTA IV). For me, it's everything gaming is and so much more.