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Retro|Spective 102: Grand Theft Auto

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    Retro|Spective 102: Grand Theft Auto




    The History in Games:
    1997 - Grand Theft Auto
    1999 - Grand Theft Auto: London 1969
    1999 - Grand Theft Auto: London 1961
    1999 - Grand Theft Auto 2
    2001 - Grand Theft Auto III
    2002 - Grand Theft Auto: Vice City
    2004 - Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
    2004 - Grand Theft Auto Advance
    2005 - Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
    2006 - Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories
    2008 - Grand Theft Auto IV
    2009 - Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and the Damned
    2009 - Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars
    2009 - Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony
    2013 - Grand Theft Auto V

    Overview:
    Looking back, the sole existence of GTAV in the last decade is staggering compared to the scale of advancement and output in the years proceeding it. Split into three universes the franchise opened with the 2D universe, the original top down game making an impressive mark for 2D games during the dawn of the 3D era. Whilst the second game didn't make as strong a mark it was soon after that the third game brought the gameplay into the 3D era and it quietly launched before rapidly causing an industry wide revolution. It's follow ups arrived in quick succession with the expansive Vice City followed by the state wide San Andreas before Rockstar managed to condense the experiences with the portable based yet accurate to play Stories entries. The series went more cinematic and physics based for the successful but polarising fourth game before striking gold with the fifth game which met universal acclaim but is now more known for its immensely successful but sequel halting online multiplayer.












    Share your thoughts and memories of the Grand Theft Auto series

    #2
    Well, I'm not really into the series as a whole but GTAV was absolutely brilliant, terrible controls aside! It was a fantastic playground of madness and opportunity that really did feel unpredictable in its behaviours. I quite liked the characters too. I should really get it on PS4.

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      #3
      GTA for me:

      Start game, mess around for a few hours....Zzzzz.

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        #4
        I still remember when they showed GTA on The Big Breakfast with all the concern about the game's violence. Talk about free advertising, that was how I discovered the game! I went out of my way to get it and played it to death, ditto for GTA: London and GTA 2.

        Those early games are hard to go back to today though just because of all zooming in and out the camera does. It never bothered me when it came out but I cant stand it now.

        I played GTA 3 with my cousin on his PS2 one weekend where we did the typical thing of maxing out your wanted level and seeing how long you could survive.

        It wasn't until the PC release of San Andreas that I really got back into the series though. I've played through the story a number of times now, it's just an amazing game.

        I really enjoyed 4 despite all the flack it got. The Balad of Gay Tony is the highlight with that entry though.

        I'm still amazed they got 5 running as well as they did on PS3, I played the **** out of that. I also double dipped on PC but haven't completed the main story there.

        So yeah, I love GTA and I'll no doubt pick up the next one when it comes out.

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          #5
          SF man, you really come up with the goods. Will place some content here later.

          EDIT: So here goes.

          Played the first one a little back in the day, but GTA III, is where it took off for me. I played it so much, I started to involuntarily pick out structures as I walked to work that would make great sniper nests and ponder how I might be able to jump there (Dukes of Hazzard-style) in a slushy-rear-suspensioned sedan! If you judge it (as I think many here do) against tightly controlled and expertly balanced games from Japan, then the game, of course falls short. But for sheer ambition and sandbox-fun instead, it's a marvellous achievement.

          The next two, I thought were brilliant in their focus on shifting both location and time period. I think they nailed both Miami Vice style sunsets with 80s cheese, but also the urban heat of gangster rap Californ-i-ay, jeri curls, latinos et al. Interestingly, I think neither game world was as well defined with a sense of place, as GTA III, but the inclusion of motorbikes and BMXs adds loads.

          GTA IV and Gay Tony, I've never played (got both) but GTA V was the best meeting of San Andreas and Vice City, I could think of. They really made the PS3 sing. Another technical tour de force.

          I have just recently (Easter) picked up Vice City stories on PSP, which is technically amazing, but the control system really suffers on the PSP.
          Last edited by gunrock; 02-09-2019, 15:40.

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            #6
            Loved the first one, but I've disliked everything that follows. I felt that Saints Row 3 was the first game after GTA that I played which felt like a GTA sequel.

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              #7
              Yeah, thanks again, Supes.

              I've played:
              1997 - Grand Theft Auto
              2001 - Grand Theft Auto III
              2002 - Grand Theft Auto: Vice City
              2004 - Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
              2008 - Grand Theft Auto IV
              2013 - Grand Theft Auto V


              Own but not played:
              2005 - Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (Vita)
              2009 - Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and the Damned (360 Episodes from Liberty City)
              2009 - Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony (360 Episodes from Liberty City)

              The original GTA was amazing.
              Anyone else have the demo on the Official Playstaion Magazine and absolutely caned it?
              Me and my mates would compete before the timer ran out to see who could kill the most people.
              If you got a Gouranga, you'd be set.


              It was crazy to think you were encouraged to kill people within a religion for a bonus!

              I think we tried the console link once, but the map was too big and it was a little tedious to find each other.

              I remember the PC version looked and moved loads better than the PS1, but it was a minor programming miracle.
              You lost the cars when they went off-screen, but other than these issues, it played brilliantly with excellent physics on the cars. I remember reading that they saved a load of processing power when they took the roofs off the buildings.

              The ability to choose your own direction, was really innovative at the time.

              The next one I played proper was GTAIII, which once again floored me.
              It was at a time when games like MGS2 came out and I remember stuffing bad guys in a locker like a movie wowing me, and then in GTAIII, you could get in any car you found! Any car!
              It was also really pretty. Sometimes I would park on the beach, turn on the classical station and watch the sun rise.

              Vice City felt like GTA3.5, but the setting, the music, introduction of bikes and the voice acting raised it above its predecessor. I spent ages trying to get that Dodo plane to fly.

              For me, San Andreas was less of a hit. I wasn't a fan of the whole gansta theme and defending territories was a chore, especially as the police ignored everyone but you firing guns.
              There was a lot of pointless bloat with the whole exercise thing.
              The game shone best when it was being absurd. Stealing a jetpack and flying into Area 69 was a blast.

              I think I like IV more than most people. I thought Niko was a likeable character and I cared about what happened to him and his family. I spent ages in a helicopter, flying to locations on a map, shooting a pigeon and flying off again.
              I'm at 99% and have no idea how to complete it! (Key to the City)
              It hit at a time where a fair few on my mates had a 360 and we caned those co-op missions. We were gutted how few there were. We made our own games of survival in the end.
              It was pretty sweet flying into rob a bank with Queen's "One Vision" firing up.

              GTAIV was my 360 swansong, being the last game I played properly before getting a PS4 and I couldn't believe how much they packed into the game and how beautiful it could be. Flying over the city as the sun sets and the rides on the pier light up, made me gawp at the screen.
              I spent hours on this, just milling around the city, collecting the money cases, UFO pieces, serial killer clues and so on.
              It was like a black slate, so when the other characters came in, I didn't like it as much. I particularly disliked Trevor.
              I got as far as the mission where you can command the stock exchange and hesitated, trying to do it "right" and then the PS4 arrived.
              I'm tempted to replay the game and just complete the story on PS4.

              At this moment in time, I have many, many hours of fun from the series, and would love to see a GTAVI one day, but the amount of money that V is making online, I can't see that happening any time soon.

              I'm also a little uncomfortable with the "crunch" practices that Rockstar force on their staff and the recent tax revelations.
              They've earned an estimated £4bn between 2013-19, payed no Corporation Tax for 10 years and they received £42m in tax credits from the government’s video games tax relief scheme, which is equivalent to 19% of the total relief paid to the entire UK games industry since the scheme started in 2014.

              I'd think twice about buying another of their games, despite the fun I've had playing the GTA and RDR series.

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                #8
                In fact, I should mention that the world they've made in V is astonishing, but a little puerile.

                I've mentioned before that I wish there was a child-friendly mod that just let you explore, without the need to kill people or the unnecessary swearing on the radio.

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                  #9
                  The series only really grabbed me when it transitioned into 3D. I bought the US import of III on a total whim and it was amazing. I loved how you could create your own cinematic moments instead of having them spoon-fed: choosing a kick-ass song, cruising around, causing some mayhem, avoiding some mayhem. That level of freedom was something I'd never experienced before. I remember at the time a mate of mine was round and he couldn't believe what he was seeing/playing. He bought a PS2 that same week just to play it. Then VC. Then San Andreas.

                  Speaking of which, San Andreas was the biggie for me. The hazy orange California skies gave it such a perfect vibe ... cruising in an El Camino-alike with NWA blasting ... absolutely loved it. The amount of different ways to approach missions showed the brilliance and stability of the game. And the transitions into the new areas were involving ... not a cutscene or an end-of/start-of new chapter ... you drove through the night from LA to San Fran talking to Peter Fonda and listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd, arriving as the sun was coming up ... that's pure consideration for the player's experience. It could have been good enough but it was much better than that thanks to the extra care and thought. San Andreas is one of only two I've completed. I really should get around to playing V again. No excuses. That was a great game too. Trevor Philips!!!

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                    #10
                    GTA really isn’t my thing... the only one I’ve ever played through was Chinatown Wars on the iPad.

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                      #11
                      [MENTION=15014]_SD_[/MENTION]: Ooh, forgot about the only DS outing. Chinatown Wars on DS (original phat) was really good. Really great use of the DS.

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                        #12
                        The drug dealing in Chinatown Wars was actually insanely detective. It was actually a more interesting title than Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories were, since it was a properly tailored handheld game rather than simply a new story in an existing setting from the PS2. That said, I did enjoy LCS and VCS - particularly VCS, which had its own immensely addictive endgame in the form of owning various hubs and defending them. Neither were as good as the PS2 titles they followed though.

                        I have a TON of love for the GTA series personally. They're always just so much fun. It feels like a long long time ago that I played 5 now (incredible that it's still in the charts, much like MK8, which also feels like ancient history), but that was a really tremendous game.

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                          #13
                          For me the series has had it's bumps in the road and entries have a habit of aging poorly as well but when they hit the nail on the head on a new one it's success is well earned. I've played pretty much all of them to varying degrees but the 2D entries largely stand out as the weakest ones for me:

                          Grand Theft Auto
                          Played it a fair bit back when it came out and it felt like reasonable senseless fun but I always found the top down view frustrating, that's not specific to GTA though - it's just as true of any similar game as well. When the London expansion hit and GTA2 arrived I dabbled with both but my interest was burning out fast.

                          Grand Theft Auto III
                          I knew it was coming but this largely stealthed up on me. Hype was low and the game didn't look that great in screenshots, there was little reason to believe it wouldn't simply be a ropey budget adaptation of the 2D games. Ended up getting it on day one though for the sake of something new to play and that first night, man, it's so rare that a game just utterly obsesses your mind. The on foot controls were always weak but GTA3 was particularly suited to letting you take whatever approach you wanted and it was amazing how often you wondered 'I wonder if I can do X or reach Y' and it turned out there was a way. To this day I can recall nearly every part of Liberty City's layout which isn't even true to that extent of all the other entries.

                          Grand Theft Auto: Vice City
                          That this arrived the next year was amazing in itself. That being said I never subscribed to the notion that it was better than GTA3 myself as much as I did enjoy it. It added loads of vehicle types and captured the 80s Miami vibe really well but the setting meant there was a real lack of verticality and someone at Rockstar had made the connection that 80's cars etc would be lighter than circa 2000 ones so the handling of all the vehicles reflected that and it didn't play quite as well. None the less it was a great continuation.

                          Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
                          When I first started playing this I was concerned they'd missed the mark. The opening hours in its version of LA are very weak and the cast of characters and focus on things like the gym, cycling etc a turn off. But this was the second time the game managed to take over my mind with obsession. The point in which CJ leaves the city for the first time and missions begin to pull you towards the mountain... the city design in San Andreas is universally awful but the moment you stand at the base of that mountain and discover there's so much more to the game... and then that it's all traversable and still on the same system that delivered GTA3... it was amazing. The only bumps after where the other two cities, their geometry paying the price for the expansive world but it was amazing in between those bits and the vehicles etc all controlled better again.

                          I've played both LCS and VCS at various points but never to completion, I need to do them at some point but always intended to do the PS2 versions rather than continue on portable.

                          Grand Theft Auto IV
                          When they announced Liberty City was coming back that was great. It's one of the few times I midnight queued as well, man, what a disappointment GTA4 was. Whilst not a bad game it was a fall back in almost every way from where the PS2 era left off. The story was guff, it gets a lot of praise but I've always felt highlighting GTA4 as a strong Rockstar story speaks more to the poor storytellers they are, GTA4 had numerous issues and one of the biggest was Rockstars inflated cinematic ambitions -the series has never suited a heavy lean into this territory. The offset camera was a pain when driving, the physics were over focused on providing incidental details at the expense of control, it was dingy looking, the city layout was miserable and forgettable and it played poorly like you were steering tugboats through treacle. The building blocks of the series pinned it together but I left this one concerned that this focus on the wrong areas would ruin the series going forward - fortunately it didn't even if it would rear its head as an issue again in RDR2.

                          Grand Theft Auto V
                          Getting this was always a given but I wasn't that hyped after GTA4, this is the third and last time that playing a GTA managed to catch me off guard somewhat as the game just fixes so much from GTA4 is a joy to play by comparison. Better camera, better on foot controls (even if they're not perfect), well designed environment layouts, the right balance of stupid and grounded, spot on vehicle physics etc. It was an amazing accomplishment for last gen tech and a brilliant jumping point for the next instalment that... never came. I hope GTAVI can catch me off guard too as my interest is genuinely dying off as the series fades from feeling relevant to me.

                          When it's great though, it's success is well earned.

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                            #14
                            Peak GTA nostalgia:





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                              #15
                              There is almost too much for me to say about GTA. I loved the first one on the PS1 but it was GTA3 that was the game changer. And to this day, I find myself feeling like GTA3 had one of the best locations in that it was small enough that you could really get to know it but it also had loads of variety to offer, straights, hills and all sorts of places that were simply fun to drive around. Vice City was brilliant in its atmosphere and soundtrack but it was all pretty flat if I remember correctly and not quite as fun to just drive in.

                              3 and Vice City also had the perfect content to space ratio for me. San Andreas was amazing in so many ways but there was precious little to find in a lot of places meaning that a lot of it was essentially just backdrop. Too much space, not enough to do in it. Outside of the first area, I never really got to know my way around San Andreas.

                              Then GTA4 happened and, while there was lots to appreciate and admire at least technically, it made driving around boring... in a game that was mostly driving around. If you find yourself taking taxis to bypass the central mechanic of a game, you know something is wrong. The streets felt dull and awkward to get around and the car handling felt at odds with the areas you needed to get around. And that space to content ratio was way off. People called it a sandbox game but, no, because it was a giant box with almost no sand in it. You couldn't interact with most things in the game. The Ballad of Gay Tony went some way towards injecting more fun but it was on top of a dull base.

                              But then GTAV rectified that, giving a great location worthy of exploration and it was back to being fun to drive in. I could praise GTAV in so many ways and I think it deserves a lot of kudos but I do think it suffers a little from the space to content ratio being out of whack. I can appreciate GTAV but, after I finished it, I never really went back to it and it's not one I remember all that fondly. I don't think I connected with the characters or story in it and some things I just plain didn't like (a torture scene sticks in my memory). I prefer GTA when it's just being fun. That fun can be dark and cross lines but if it's just dark without fun I'm not into it.

                              The Stories games on PSP were fine. They did what they needed to do. But Chinatown Wars deserves special mention for building a different GTA experience that was actually really good. There's a lot to love in that game and they really made it work on the systems it was on.

                              Will we ever see a new GTA?

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