Grand Theft Auto: A story of Incline and then Decline?

[Feyd Rautha]

I really liked GTA1 and also GTA2. I was excited for 3 but couldn't get into it and I just hated it. It was awful.

A game that replicates the gameplay of the first two games could really be something.

 

[Lord of Riva]

GTA 2 was a blast. It looks really cool as well.

Never could get into the 3D GTAs much, the shooting in the console games were always completely arse and while I played five and that plays fine, I found it rather bland (outside the heists) and just played it becaus it was supposed to be the "most impressive game ever" and with a discount.

It's not the formula per se btw, I did enjoy RDR2 *a lot* more. The same with saints row 2 and 3.

 

[deuxhero]

Worth noting GTA3 came out before the PS2 was a year old. That era was full of clunky but ambitious and interesting games (including four FromSoft games somehow.) so people didn't really have as much of an issue with that clumsiness because near everything had it.

 

[Dave the Druid]

ALSO RIP, Gary Busey

Busey ain't dead, which is actually kinda surprising considering he's 79 now and has a history of substance a-BUSEY (eh eh I'll get my coat).

He was in a hit-and-run 2 weeks ago lmao:

 

[Konjad]

I like GTA series. I played all GTAs from the first one to the last one (except small story games) and there are three distinctively good, but the whole series is worth playing through.

Of top-down GTAs the best one is Chinatown Wars. Has all the best of GTA series, and is the most fun just to drive around and has actually good mini-games (car jacking etc) thanks to NDS touch screen.

The other two very good ones are Vice City and San Andreas. These are the peak of 3D GTAs.

GTA 4 has the best somewhat-realistic driving and NPC reactions, both gone in GTA 5.

That said, aside from Chinatown Wars and, VC and SA, I'd rather recommend Sleeping Dogs over other GTA entries. Saints Row 2 as well (but not other Saint Rows).

 

[Maxie]

you will stop idolizing criminal life and play something with heroes in it

 

[Lord of Riva]

Worth noting GTA3 came out before the PS2 was a year old. That era was full of clunky but ambitious and interesting games (including four FromSoft games somehow.) so people didn't really have as much of an issue with that clumsiness because near everything had it.

The early 3d era was pretty shit tbh and I always hated the clunkiness in it and still do. When I was younger I never understood why they would force it so much when there were excellent 2d games around.

All this has been fixed by now of course but the first few years was a dark-age of videogames, at least when we look at playability and gameplay.

 

[Grunker]

I think this guy gets it, if you can stomach his demeanour:

 

[Maxie]

I think this guy gets it, if you can stomach his demeanour:

ah yes a white guy youtube essay is exactly what we need

 

[karoliner]

What are the great games of this franchise?

Bully, San Andreas and Vice City.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I've played 3, VC, SA, 4 and its spinoffs, 5.

My all-time favourite is Vice City because it hits all the points I want from these dumb games which is basically cruising around the city, driving like an asshole, while listening to music I like. It had the side benefits of some emergent gameplay moments to like racking up a bunch of stars and getting in a high speed chase while I Ran (So Far Away) by Flock of Seagulls plays on the radio.

I couldn't get into San Andreas because I hate rap and couldn't relate to playing some hood rat in the ghetto, so just bounced off it hard. Occasionally I try to go back to it because of the RPG mechanics I hear about, but I've never managed.

4 was underrated but all those fucking dating/social phone calls. Fuck that mechanic. It had some nice things though like the comedy club bits, etc. It was a good time.

Couldn't get into 5, so have barely touched it. I think the character hopping around thing turned me off the most.

I hated 3. The wonky ass driving and car physics and general fragility of many of the cars just... bleh. I did play it a fair bit though. Many hookers died in the streets of 00s Liberty City.

Anyway, the shooting mechanics and such are usually pretty crap. The games are usually about absurd crime dramas (similar to the Yakuza series in a way) and driving like a dickhead in ways that would get you imprisoned or killed in real life imo.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Just because I see people talking about them above. Saints Row 2 is fantastic and probably the second best GTA style experience I've had (after VC).
Saints Row 3 is just bonkers, but hilarious. Also a good time. Probably on par with GTA 4 (albeit in a COMPLETELY different direction) for me.

 

[Zoo]

Greetings.
What in your highly scientific gamer opinion did the GTA franchise done right? I find it interesting how many ignore the first entries in the series (I confess I rather like the top down perspective of 1 and 2 and the games as a whole, rough, rugged, you get the idea) and GTA 3, a game which is renown for its difficult missions.
Vice City needs no further introduction. It was a major hit and started the trend of Rockstar hiring movie stars to voice their characters (Burt Reynolds - RIP, Tom Sizemore - also RIP, Ray Liotta - ALSO RIP, Gary Busey, etc). A personal favorite, inspired by shows like Miami Vice and movies like Scarface it has style, flash, neon lights, glorious 80s setting and a near perfect soundtrack (VRock and Wave 101 are great).
Anyway, what do YOU think?
What are the great games of this franchise? Which are really bad?

I've played all GTA from 1 to San Andreas, except the expansion (London 1969) and the expansion of the expansion (London 1961). I love them all (we enjoyed 1-2 on LAN parties), but my favourite was 3, I actually bought a new PC for that game (and for WarCraft 3 and Return to Castle Wolfenstein). It was a huge step, and I thoght it was hard. But I have finished a walktrough in 2017, and it was piss easy with a gamepad. I think it even easier than Assassin's Creed 1. Only the sniping missions are hard with gamepad, but hey are doable, of course I suggest mouse for them. Of course, the last and optional Diablo mission when you have to collect porn comics with an awful van can be frustrating, and some other side contents can be frustrating (like the paramedic missions or the checkpoint side-missions).

I have never tried any GTA newer than San Andreas, and I have only finished 3, because I really hated the infamous RC helicopter mission in VC and the flight school in SA. Howewer, I have finished all the optional RC helicopter side-missions in SA.

 

[Butter]

I believe that VC is overrated because the 80s homage theme (and soundtrack), as well as the much needed improvements over GTA3 being introduced, left people with a better impression despite weaknesses over both GTA3 and San Andreas. Vice City's area design is the worst of the three, the city lacks the detail level of GTA3's Liberty City and the variety of San Andreas. GTA3's city felt like every area was made with a specific purpose (mission) in mind, while Vice City's neighborhoods, especially on the second island, feel like they just had to fill the area with something before a deadline. The other bigger problem is that the game's single player "campaign" seems to fall apart once you have to buy businesses. Only the club and porn studio have mission chains of proper length, the rest seems rushed.

Remember Shoreside Vale? That's one of the biggest "Oh, this was clearly unfinished" moments in video games.

 

[BLOBERT]

BROS I PLAYED MOST OF THEM CLOSE TO WHEN THEY CAME OUT

1 WAS FUN ENOUGH BUT DIDNTPLAY MUCH OF 2 THEY HAD A COOL NEW GAME TYOW WITH GOOD PRODUCTION VALUES

GTA 2 WAS WEIRDER WITH A SORTA FUTURE VIBE

3 WAS AMAZING WHEN IT CAME OUT THEN VICE AND SAN ANDREA WERE TONS OF FUN AND VICE CITY HAD JUST AM AMAZING SOUNDTRACK AND ATMOSPHERE FOR THE TIME PLUS THE WHOLE PLOT OF BUILDING A CRIMINAL EMPIRE

4 WAS A HUGE TECHNICAL IMPROVEMENT IN MANY WAYS AND THE DC EPISODES REALLY SHINES THE BIKER ONE WAS REALLY COOL ALTHOUGH THE STORY SEEMED WEIRD AND FORCED

I CANT DEAL WITH 5 SWITCHING BROS JUST DOESNT WORK FOR ME

 

[Hellraiser]

Remember Shoreside Vale? That's one of the biggest "Oh, this was clearly unfinished" moments in video games.

Yes, mentioned it and that it felt rushed earlier when I wrote about GTA3 in the same post.

 

[Kev Inkline]

I think this guy gets it, if you can stomach his demeanour:

Thumbnail alone makes me never ever to click his vidyas.

 

[orcinator]

The best GTA clone was Sleeping Dogs, not Saints Row.

Meme game with shit-mediocre everything.
Tiny world with nothing in it, atrocious driving and bamham combat cancer.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

The best GTA clone was Sleeping Dogs, not Saints Row.

Meme game with shit-mediocre everything.
Tiny world with nothing in it, atrocious driving and bamham combat cancer.

you are in dire need of a pork bun

 

[JarlFrank]

I remember being massively disappointed by GTA3 because I loved the top-down first and second games. The shift in perspective felt to me like the series was giving up on its identity, and the approach to missions was less sandboxy.

Nowadays I have more appreciation for 3D games than I used to as a kid, but GTA3 still feels like a step down in many aspects.

GTA2 was a full sandox open world experience. You could choose which gang to work for, play for multiple gangs or just one, antagonize the others, etc etc.
It had a respect system where killing members of a gang would decrease your reputation with them, but increase the reputation with their rivals. Likewise, doing missions for a gang would increase your rep with them and decrease rep with their rivals.
Missions were divided into three tiers: green, yellow, and red. At low respect levels only the green missions are available, but as you gain respect with the gang more difficult missions will unlock.
When your respect goes far enough into the negative, gang members will attack you on sight. But you can get back into the positive by killing members of their rival gang!

The goal of the game was simply to amass a certain amount of money, after which you could progress to the next city. Completely sandbox, up to you how to get the cash, do missions for whichever gang you want or just explore and kill people lol.

From GTA3 onward, this open sandbox design was replaced with a more linear story structure.
Decline.

 

[Vic]

I think this guy gets it, if you can stomach his demeanour:

Thumbnail alone makes me never ever to click his vidyas.

I thought he was pregnant

 

[Lucumo]

I think this guy gets it, if you can stomach his demeanour:

Thumbnail alone makes me never ever to click his vidyas.

I thought he was pregnant

Well, why else would he have a ball for pregnant people?

I remember being massively disappointed by GTA3 because I loved the top-down first and second games.

The driving can still be done from the top-down perspective at least.

 

[Hellraiser]

From GTA3 onward, this open sandbox design was replaced with a more linear story structure.
Decline.

They kind of tried to return to it in the later part of Vice City with the properties, where the available mission rewards alone didn't give enough cash to buy them and waiting for the mansion income to pile up wasn't exactly fun (more like a fallback if you run out of money for ammo). At least I don't remember if you could go full jew since the start of the game to save enough cash to immediately buy the printworks and whatever else was mandatory for the epilogue as soon as those unlocked.

It's a shame though they didn't try to to evolve that concept. Rockstar seems to keep adding new systems in their next game and then they just ditch them. Or at least they did because GTAV didn't really add a new system, just a character switching gimmick.

 

[NecroLord]

From GTA3 onward, this open sandbox design was replaced with a more linear story structure.
Decline.

They kind of tried to return to it in the later part of Vice City with the properties, where the available mission rewards alone didn't give enough cash to buy them and waiting for the mansion income to pile up wasn't exactly fun (more like a fallback if you run out of money for ammo). At least I don't remember if you could go full jew since the start of the game to save enough cash to immediately buy the printworks and whatever else was mandatory for the epilogue as soon as those unlocked.

It's a shame though they didn't try to to evolve that concept. Rockstar seems to keep adding new systems in their next game and then they just ditch them. Or at least they did because GTAV didn't really add a new system, just a character switching gimmick.

Racing is a great way to make money.
The last racing challenge (tier 6) earns you 40000 each time you win.

 

[Hellraiser]

Racing is a great way to make money.
The last racing challenge (tier 6) earns you 40000 each time you win.

Wasn't that unlocked with the purchase of sunset autos though?

I mean in general there is a point in the game when you just get the ability to buy properties that you might be strapped for cash. Or maybe this is just me because I really like buying the downtown condo with the chopper once the western island unlocks, and that one costs like 70k?