While it’s pure speculation until confirmed, the details of a Grand Theft Auto game, Chinatown Wars, have been revealed in the latest edition of Nintendo Power. While Chinatown Wars was confirmed to be in development during Nintendo’s press event at E3 earlier this year and in a press release, no further concrete details have been announced. Sam Houser, co-founder of Rockstar Games said of the game:

“This is a game that will deliver a rich, fast-paced and intense ‘Grand Theft Auto’ experience that will be truly unique to Nintendo’s handheld platform. Rockstar Leeds, along with the team at Rockstar North, has built upon a decade of progressive design on Grand Theft Auto, and has created something fundamentally fresh and immersive.”

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is expected to be available on the Nintendo DS in North America and Europe later this year. Click ahead to get the unverified details…

• True GTA game - sandbox gameplay, open-world environment, gritty crime narrative.
• M-rating
• Isometric camera angle
• Cel-shaded polygons w/ black borders
• good touch-screen implementation - “tasteful” minigames, streamlining interface
• UI based on a PDA - hub for email, contacts, map, music player, GPS, stat-tracking
• stats uploaded to Rockstar Social Club website via Wi-Fi
• finger-sized icons
• missions designed for shorter periods of play, arcade quality
• aiming with control pad, auto targeting with R button
• subtle autosteer
• if you fail a mission, you can jump back to the action sequence
• chain gun, flamethrower
• good portion of Liberty City is modeled in the game (different routes than console games)
• no probems with load times, draw-in or frame rate
• lots of pedestrians, cars, etc on screen
• Wanted system - objective is to disable police cars any way possible
• real-time weather effects, 24-hour day/night cycle
• lots of radio stations to listen to (more instrumentals than vocals)
• 800,000 lines of hand-optimized source code (hey, the people like the info, right?)
• no details yet on multiplayer/Wi-Fi features

Source: NeoGAF