Some 10 minutes into the game you’ll be racing across town in a golf cart as angry mobsters give hot pursuit later on you’ll find yourself climbing to the top of a Space Needle-like tower, gunning down police choppers with a shotgun that fires exploding shells. However, in a serious departure from the adventures of Niko Bellic and Johnny Klebitz, TBoGT seems hell-bent on serving up ludicrously over-the-top scenarios with every mission. It’s a typical GTA setup, with a violent but otherwise intelligent antihero surrounded by a cast of incompetent lunatics. He’s a hopeless, drug-addled mess, surrounded by leeches and hanger-ons, and he owes vast sums of money to two separate sets of gangsters.

Tony owns both Hercules and Maisonette 9 – respectively the hottest gay and straight clubs in town – but his personal life is in tatters. The player takes on the role of Luis Lopez, the Dominican-American bodyguard and business partner of Gay Tony, Liberty City’s number one nightclub owner. In short, he’s a party animal – and his infectious enthusiasm underpins the spirit of Rockstar’s final GTA IV episode. Thanks to the vocal talents of comedian Omid Djalili, Yusuf is a colourful and hugely endearing character – a maniac playboy who’ll equip you with ludicrously powerful weapons before sending you off to steal police tanks and rocket-spewing helicopters. Yusuf himself is one of many elements that make this an extremely successful add-on. Like The Lost and Damned, and GTA IV before it, TBoGT is ultimately a story about flawed, messed-up people – but this time the melancholy is all but overwhelmed by a massive streak of hedonism.

The invitation I just quoted is taken from one of the early missions in The Ballad of Gay Tony, and in many ways it sums up what this episode is all about.

Yusuf likes many things – prostitutes, class A drugs and stolen military hardware – but most of all he likes to have fun. These are the words of Yusuf Amir – spoiled rich kid, property magnate and part-time arms dealer. Will you join me, please, for an orgy of champagne, cocaine, women, watermelons and whatever else this city may have to offer?”

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