Microsoft reportedly paid Rockstar 50 Million dollars to develop downloadable content for GTA IV which will be exclusive to the Xbox 360. But what can we expect from this content when it inevitably arrives later this fall? Will it invigorate the game’s empathetic fan base, or will it prove to be a disappointment? We speculate on what fans can expect from what is shaping up to be the most hotly-anticipated DLC in the history of this controversial practice.

Value for Money

One of the things Microsoft and other developers have learned (the hard way) is that gamers demand value in their downloadable content in order to pull out their wallets. The now legendary horse armor offered to players of Oblivion demonstrated this very clearly, early on in the current hardware cycle. We expect that Microsoft will be able to purchase something special for their 50 million, and we expect that gamers will be pleasantly surprised by the amount of new content planned for this add-on.

A Whole new City?

Many fans have already speculated that Rockstar could be planning to release an entirely new playable area as part of its downloadable content. Citing previous games like Vice City and San Andreas, some say they won’t be happy with anything less than a whole new city and storyline to explore. We highly doubt that this will be the case. While Rockstar may extend the existing map of New York City to include additional boroughs, it is unlikely to offer a completely new map. We think the DLC will be something closer to PSP releases like Liberty City Stories, which introduced new characters and storyline, but didn’t radically change the existing environment. Both PSP games were extremely successful for Rockstar, so they may feel confident emulating a similar business model for the Xbox 360 release.

Based on existing rumors, statements from Rockstar execs, and our own wild speculation, we expect the DLC to contain some, if not all, of the following features:

Small but interesting additions to the existing map
A new playable character with their own story and missions
At least 20-40 hours of added gameplay per episode
Handful of new multiplayer modes
New “100 packages” type missions to pad out gameplay a bit
A few additional weapons (Flame thrower? Nailgun?)