Hey, remember when Gameloft’s game release roadmap leaked on April Fool’s Day and no one was sure if it was real? Well, the Grand Theft Auto-like we mentioned set in New Orleans seems to have missed its release window from the original leaks, but it actually exists nonetheless. As pointed out by eagle-eyed forum member Hen14, Gangstar New Orleans just soft launched in the Philippines and apparently is the “gold standard for open-world action-adventure." Turf wars seem to be the game’s online social mechanic, and I’m hoping it’s some kind of real multiplayer mode instead of just some weird social battle mechanic as a mobile GTA-like with some killer multiplayer would be really cool.
You can follow along in our forums as first impressions roll in, or follow our guide on how to download a soft launched game. I’m going to try to figure out what the password to my Philippines iTunes account is and go wild. As far as how long this soft launch is going to last, it’s really hard to say. Gameloft has had both really long and really short soft launches. It’s possible this is just to test their servers, at which point it should rollout worldwide pretty quickly. If they’re still actively tweaking and tuning the game, it’ll be a bit longer.
