Grand Theft Auto Retrospective 292
Sadkey writes "In light of the release of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories for the PSP, UGO has posted a retrospective around the GTA games. "Come take a trip through time, and see how a franchise went from a cult hit to a cultural phenomenon, set the tone for an entire generation, and made open-ended gameplay a buzzword of the early 21st century. It's a long, bumpy ride, but at the end, Grand Theft Auto stands tall as the game that changed everything.' ."
I remember playing the top down GTAs and just loving it. Great games.
So far as open-ended goes... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So far as open-ended goes... (Score:2, Insightful)
GTA was fun (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So far as open-ended goes... (Score:4, Insightful)
But even with GTA, the "open ended" aspect wasn't really all that great. The frustration of not being able to leave the island, even if you figured out how to get around the barriers set up, was one example. And it's not like the "life of crime sim" was new, Rockstar just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Same for Maxis, actually.
Re:Was GTA 3 the pinnacle? (Score:5, Insightful)
For example, I like how Vice City added planes and motorcycles and whatnot, as well as the extra mission types (pizza delivery, "property" missions). I also like how San Andreas was just so big -- unlike Vice City and GTA3, it actually feels like a world.
The thing I don't like about Vice City and San Andreas, though, is how the character has his own personality. With GTA3's "generic thug" character, it felt more like it was you in the game. It's considerably harder to suspend disbelief in San Andreas, since the character has such a strong personality of his own.
What I'd Like To See (Score:4, Insightful)
What I would like to see is some of the "influence" that the GTA series has supposely had in gaming put into something other than making clones with crappier gameplay and crappier stories. Instead I would like to see developers take the massive non-linear 3D world concept and create more games like Shenmue, or given the emphasis on driving in the games, something like Fast and the Furious where the player starts down at the bottom, maybe jacking cars or working as a delivery boy, and rises on the street racing circut (OK, I would hate that game too, but it's just an idea). What about an RPG that takes place inside of a single living city? Something like Blood Omen where you play a vampire who stalks the streets of a huge vibrant faux-new york city feeding on the innocent and battling for territory against rival vampire gangs?
Of course, GTA wasn't the first game to take place in a large, non-linear city. Shenmue had a much deeper world and IIRC was out a few years before GTAIII. Crazy Taxi had a huge non-linear city, fast dangerous driving and missions as well.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that GTA may have been well executed in a lot of ways, but it wasn't necessarily THAT innovative, and that if it was as influential as the article states, then why are the only games I can find now that are vaguely based off the GTA formula horribly inferior ripoffs with the same criminal motif?
Re:Was GTA 3 the pinnacle? (Score:3, Insightful)
No. They've expanded, and they've introduced things like new vehicles, different scenery, etc, but it's the same game, just with new content. Hence the "franchise" aspect. As long as franchises are popular, then each successive game is just an expansion pack that doesn't require the original. Which is great - there are some games I'm dying for sequels because I just want more. But I know that I don't want them to change the things I like - so we expect a degree of permanence in the features and the feel of the game.
Re:Top down was ok.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, I thought of a few myself. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:So far as open-ended goes... (Score:4, Insightful)
Wrong... Check out Streets of Sim City and Sim Copter. Both were 3d worlds and played from the perspective of one character.
Check out some sim copter screens... [gamespot.com] Remind you of something else? [g-unleashed.com]
Overrated (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Interesting (Score:3, Insightful)
I do like the Tommy Vercetti character, for the same reasons you do. Additionally, they managed to not load it down so much as to become obnoxious (unlike San Andreas).
Re:Eh? (Score:4, Insightful)
And as far as immersing yourself in things not OK in the real world, I'd hardly hold up written fiction (or cinema, or opera, or mythology or...) as a good example of the "right" way of doing things.
Re:Overrated (Score:2, Insightful)
Aside from weapons, cars, etc., VC improved on GTA 3 by giving the main character lines, making the map a loop as opposed to a line allowing for more fluid movement between sections, had better side characters, such as the coked up lawyer no doubt inspired by Kleinfeld from Carlito's Way, and of course a more satisfying ending. SA further evolved the main character idea away from the simple brute of VC, had a rich cultural environment of cityscape, clothing style, hair cuts, tattoos, eating, working out, of course a fucking great soundtrack, was way larger than GTA 3 or VC, had planes and parachutes, and perhaps the best advancement, you could finally swim.
But, I guess your right, no change, no fun game play... I guess all of us who love the series are just smoking crack.
Re:Interesting (Score:4, Insightful)
And the missions were perfect. If you avoided the rampages, you never had to kill innocents. So you could easily be a 'noble' mobster who doesn't endanger the lives of bystanders. You save the gun, baseball bat, grenades, rockets, etc., for the people who are soldiers: other gangsters or the police.
That was what was perfect about GTA3: you could make your own moral choices. Even though the game let you play sniper, run over pedestrians, or kill prostitutes for their money, you didn't have to. You could even be especially moral and only steal parked cars or police cars, thus endangering innocents even less.
I liked Vice City and San Andreas, but the games lost something when the main guy started to talk. San Andreas lost extra points by having missions where you had to kill innocents in order to advance.
Re:open gameplay - waste of time (Score:5, Insightful)
All respect to Rockstar, the game is kickass, I just cannot help it but it leaves me all the time with the game unfinished and me bored to hell of it.
What I find interesting is that the type of games you mention above strike me as incredibly boring! I don't feel like I'm getting anything done, more like just trying to run a race fast enough.
It gets boring very quickly. But, with the "open ended" games, I get the feeling like I can do whatever I want. If I want to break into an airport and steal a plane and fly around, I can. Or, drive a car, or swim across the ocean, or go look for shellfish, or whatever.
Typical gameplay might go something like this:
I do missions for a while, and get bored. Then, I grab a bike, and try to see how much money I can get for an "insane stunt bonus". After a while of that, I drive the bike into a lake, and start mowing down cops just to see what kind of gun I can get. Then, I buy a house and save game to shed the wanted level. (wouldn't it be neat to be able to mix/match Sims2 with GTA?) Do a mission or two. Grab a boat and do some jumps. Then, be a cab driver and try to get 5 people delivered before having to bail the cab. Etc.
If I could do this multi-player, it would just so rock. Also, it'd be way cool if the map could be edited. Can you imagine how lost you'd get if you could make buildings with arbitrary graphics, sorta like the WAD or PUD files of old?
But, whatever you do, don't give me a boring, linear, mono-topic game where I just run around and shoot people. Ayugh!
Re:Was GTA 3 the pinnacle? (Score:2, Insightful)
IHBT?
Re:Overrated (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, when I first got that game, I spent the entire day riding a mountain bike through the countryside north of Los Santos, finding paths and doing jumps. I kept getting lost, though. I think San Andreas' map was six times the size of Vice City, at least. Los Santos proper is probably bigger than the entire area in the last game.
Personally, while I agree GTA3 was pretty generic, Vice City and San Andreas really had decent stories. They're not oscar contenders or anything, but compared to most insane video game plots, they're quite well-written and keep my attention. I liked the characters I was supposed to like, hated the characters I was supposed to hate, and was appropriately outraged whenever I was betrayed. A popcorn flick at best, but that's still high praise in the game industry.
Of course, it depends on what you're looking for in a game. As another reply states, there are a lot of games that do specific things GTA does and does them better, but that's obvious. I like it because I have this large area, the open-ended feeling, and all these possible choices. Sure I could grab a game where I'm Bike Man and do crazy bike tricks, or Nameless Racing Person in a car with better graphics and courses, or Heavily Armed Guy In Space Armor that specializes in running around and shooting stuff, but it loses the experience that GTA has. I like being Tommy or CJ, with the silly little catchphrases and the outfits, going through my town and wreaking havoc or playing relatively harmless games as I choose.
That's the one other thing. The violence was hardly the focus for me. I mean, sure, I'd run down gang members when I had the chance, and I hated drug dealers, but I'd swerve to avoid the elderly and some of the more likeable citizenry. In San Andreas, when you were given the option to chat with passers-by, I was very polite to people that complimented me. It just made the game more interactive. That was why I played. It's a city sim from the little guy's perspective. And you can do whatever the hell you want with it.
Re:GTA is pure evil (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Multiplayer (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, I know the bus in GTA is more realistic... but that doesn't make it any funner to drive, does it?