A right royal pain in the GTAs

I’ve written before about the bad design decisions that can suck the joy from a game, encouraging you to put it back on the shelf and never return, and Grand Theft Auto 4 has a doozy: stupid bloody save points. It’s particularly noticeable on a mission where you have to trail a drug dealer’s car before taking out his associates; get any part of it wrong and you have to replay the whole mission again, cringing as once again your character makes an ill-judged and unfunny wisecrack about stalking women. It wouldn’t be so bad if the bits you had to replay weren’t so ARSE-NUMBINGLY DULL.