Not a good time to hope for 'just a warning'

Rockstar continue to hop, skip and jump across the subgenres of the crime film and their latest Grand Theft Auto game lands them squarely in the middle of the biker gang film. The Lost and Damned is one of the biggest and broadest expansions to a console game you are ever likely to play. With the time to complete coming in at about ten hours its the same size and commitment to complete as most retail games you've been playing. Right now your imagination is probably piecing together the words 'Grand Theft Auto' and 'expansion' and seeing a series of missions following on from the original game, maybe opening up some new areas, new cars and weapons. Know then that The Lost and Damned is a completely new experience that is distinctly different from playing as Nico Bellic. Even if you're suffering from GTA related fatigue after plowing through the fifty plus hour original game, The Lost and Damned will draw you back into Liberty City with a lap dancers well practised wink and a promise.

Unless you’re a lot sharper than I am (which is actually quite likely) you won’t realise until about the fifth mission in that you’ve met your lead character Johnny Klebitz before while adventuring with Nico in the original GTA IV campaign. In fact the story of the Lost weaves in and out of the original Grand Theft Auto story like, well like a Harley Davidson driving through traffic. You’ll meet a number of characters you’ve met before and in many cases have very different interactions with them than you did with Nico. The game picks up with the Lost’s leader Billy getting out of prison; playing as second in command Johnny you pick up your boss and immediately head to get his bike which, as anyone who has seen a classic exploitation biker flick knows, will result in a blood bath.

Billy is a nasty piece of work. He’s a liar and a manipulator and at the same time too stupid to be kept under control. He quickly goes about setting of a gang war with a rival club and spending his off time time getting wasted. To make matters worse he’s manically paranoid of Johnny trying to muscle him out and any attempts by Johnny to cool things down fans the flames. On top of all this Johnny has a couple of cops breathing down his neck, a naked senator (if you're one of those sad homophobe's that freak at the site of a penis have a pillow ready to throw over your eyes) asking for favours and a junkie ex girlfriend that seems adept at attracting serious trouble. Man, being a bikie is hard work, no wonder they’re always so grumpy.

Again it should be noted that this isn’t just a bunch of new missions and a new character. Lost and Damned is a new style of game. For one thing your bike is your brother, any moment you’re not riding your trademark Hexer motorbike you feel naked. I spent most of my time as Nico catching cabs and driving. But playing as Johnny I felt obligated to ride that chopper around and it just felt plain cool. If you’re cringing from your previous GTA motor bike experiences you can relax; the handling and weight of the bikes has been tweaked considerably and riding is just as easy, often more advantageous, than driving.

The boys are back in town, time for a holiday

You also now have a gang and when riding in formation with your troops a Lost insignia appears on the road. Holding your position over the insignia increases health of both you and your bike. You can also phone your gang for various services. Terry parks nearby in the Lost’s customised gun van, a sweet shop of firearms including the expansions new additions, an automatic shotgun and a pipe bomb. Clay will drop a bike off to you where ever you are should you find yourself stranded. You can also call for back up at any time, in and out of missions, and your gang will roll up to either follow you faithfully or save your ass.

The expansion also opens up a few new fun game types. The first is motor bike races that appear at random locations all over the city. Fans of arcade classic Road Rash will be pleased to know most of the race revolves around trying to bash your opposition of their bikes with a baseball bat. The other side mission is a gang war, when you head to a gang war location the rest of your mob roll up and an enemy marker appears on your map, then you have to chase down the opposition. In some cases its an out and out battle against a rival biker gang or a group of mafia or mobsters. In other missions you have to capture or kill a specific target assassination style. There's also the customary actual bit of GTA with missions for your wheelchair bound buddy Angus. You're given a target to steal from and you have to get hold of their vehicle, usually a bike, and bring it back to your base. These side missions are entirely optional and you can complete as many as you like. I must have done over twenty gang wars and they just kept appearing on the map. Successfully completing them earns you cash and gang wars also earn you experience for your biker buddies. Members of your gang killed during these missions have their photograph added to your memorial wall back at the club house.

Yes you have a club house! Complete with bar, dancing girl, pool table, card games and arm wrestling competitions. You also have the usual GTA amenities; a bed to save your game, a TV and a computer with interwebs access and a sawn of shotgun (best weapon for bike mounted killing) on the shelf. You want more? Greedy SOB, I oughtta knock your teeth out. How about this, The Lost and Damned introduces mid mission check points so should you accidentally get shot by thirty police men you can answer a text message and go straight back to the middle of the mission. For many people this was the main point of contention with the GTA series and Rockstar have finally, and quite unexpectedly, done something about it.

You still want more? Well how about the fact that the expansion comes with all new multiplayer modes including Witness Protection where The Lost must try to eliminate a bus carrying witnesses while the other team tries to stop them as NOOSE, Lone Wolf Biker, it’s juggernaut on motor bikes, one biker versus the rest, Club Business, like Mafia mode but with 8 players riding together as a gang and Chopper vs. Chopper, a biker tries to get through checkpoints while an armed helicopter tries to stop him. Plus of course biker themed skins for characters and the new weapons and motor bikes in multiplayer.

Australian players will be especially pleased to discover that the previously edited violence and sex scenes from the console GTA IV release have been left in The Lost and Damned. I first noticed this when I fired my sawn-off shotgun over the handle bars of my chopper at an unlucky enemy biker and had his blood spray the screen. Now when you pick up a rather husky lady of the evening you’ll be ‘lucky’ enough to see those scenes the American’s have seen since the games release. Unfortunately Nico’s adventure remains annoyingly censored. So essentially you’re getting about a 75% brand new Grand Theft Auto game for less than half the cost of the original game. Short of a whole new city The Lost and Damned delivers everything you could ask for and more. It sets the bar about as high as it can go for downloadable content and pretty damn high for Rockstar themselves. It will be very interesting to see how well expectations are met with the next episode.