Grand Theft Auto (GTA) is a computer and video game created by Scottish company, DMA Design (now Rockstar North) and published by ASC Games in 1997/1998. The game allows the player to take on the role of a criminal who can roam freely around a city. Various missions are set for completion, such as bank robberies, assassinations, and other crimes. It is the first in the Grand Theft Auto series that has this far spanned eight standalone games, and two expansion packs. The game was originally named "Race N Chase". And me own opinion gta is one of the best serias games .

Grand Theft Auto is made up of a series of levels each set in one of the three cities in the game. In each level, the player has a target number of points to achieve, and five lives to attain the score. The player is free to do whatever he wants. The player can gain points by causing death and destruction amid the traffic in the city, or steal and sell cars for profit, although to get to the large target money amount to complete a level, players will usually go to complete some missions. Even during missions there is still some freedom as most of the time the player is free to choose the route to take, but the destination is usually fixed. It is this level of freedom which set GTA apart from other action based computer games at the time. If you don't do any mission you can freely play in the map .

Players are able to choose to play as eight characters in the game: Travis, Kat, Mikki, Divine, Bubba, Troy, Kivlov and Ulrika. In actual gameplay, the only real difference is the color of their shirt. You may also name your character, which, with the correct name, acts like a cheat code and enhances gameplay. However, these characters have never been seen in any other GTA game to date and are relatively unknown as in the case of Grand Theft Auto: London 1961.

GTA2 retained the top-down viewpoint of GTA, as well as the telephone-answering formula of the original. The player has the ability to explore cities on foot or in various vehicles. The aim is to achieve a certain score. On achieving this goal the player then can proceed to the next level. Doing missions awards the player more points than any other method but are not essential for completion of the game.

A new feature introduced in GTA2 was doing missions for separate gangs, of which there are two new gangs for each of the three levels of the game, and one faction which is present in all levels. Being employed by one gang can cause distrust from others (working for gang #1 will incur the wrath of gang #2, working for gang #2 will cause enmity with gang #3, etcetera). In the original GTA, only the local police pursued the player. In GTA2, SWAT teams, as well as two new law enforcement agencies, Special Agents and the army, can begin chasing the player as his or her wanted level increases.

GTA2 also included a saving technique that improved upon that of the original GTA, which saved only when finishing a city. If the player entered a church with $50,000, a voice announced "Hallelujah! Another soul saved!". This notified the player that the game had been saved. If the player did not have enough money, the voice would say "Damnation! No donation, no salvation!" The "safe house" feature would become standard and expanded upon in later GTA games, although saving would become free of cost.

Other minor improvements pertain to city activity. Passing vehicles and pedestrians are no longer cosmetic parts of the environment, but actually play a more significant role in gameplay. Sometimes pedestrians would occasionally enter and ride in taxis. The game is also noted for the emergent behavior of its non-player characters. Pedestrians, gang members and the police would occasionally engage in fights, and there are even other carjackers (Green sweater) and muggers (Red sweater) in the city.

The PlayStation version of Grand Theft Auto 2 is noticeably toned down from its PC counterpart, with lower quotas for the number of kills needed in rampage style missions, and containing no voice acting in the saving interface. The port also includes an unusual feature wherein the player's car will explode after the player runs over a large number of gang members. One level was also changed. Instead of the player tricking civilians into entering a bus to drive them to a meat processing plant to be cannibalized, the victims are Hare Krishna gang members.

As is the case with the original Grand Theft Auto and GTA London: 1969, the player receives bonuses for running over certain people with car without stopping or braking. A string of Elvis impersonators are sometimes spotted walking the streets. Their deaths are awarded with a large money bonus, followed by the bold words "ELVIS HAS LEFT THE BUILDING".

The PC version of GTA2 was released as a free download on December 22, 2004. This version also includes support for multiplayer games.

Grand Theft Auto III (abbreviated as GTA III or GTA3) is a sandbox-style action-adventure computer and video game developed by DMA Design (now Rockstar North), and published by Rockstar Games. It is the first 3D title in the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series and the third original title overall. It was released in October 2001 for the PlayStation 2 video game console, May 2002 for Windows-based personal computers, and in November 2003 for the Xbox video game console. The game was preceded by Grand Theft Auto 2 and succeeded by Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

The player character has robbed the Liberty City Bank with his girlfriend, Catalina, and a male accomplice. While running from the scene, Catalina turns to him , "Sorry, babe, I'm an ambitious girl and you ... you're just small-time". She shoots him and leaves him to die in an alley; the accomplice is also seen lying nearby. It soon becomes apparent that the player character has survived but has been arrested and subsequently found guilty and sentenced to jail. While he is being transferred, an attack on the police convoy aimed at kidnapping an unrelated prisoner sets him free.

With the help of a fellow escaped prisoner, the player character then takes on work as a local thug and rises in power as he works for multiple rival crime gangs, a corrupt police officer and a media mogul. In the process, Maria, the wife of a local Mafia boss, begins to take a liking to him. The Mafia leader, Salvatore, grows suspicious and lures the player to a death trap; but Maria saves him, remaining close to him throughout the storyline. He later goes to work for others, including the Liberty City Yakuza and media mogul Donald Love. Eventually, his exploits attract the attention of Catalina, now affiliated with a Colombian cartel, resulting in the kidnapping of Maria. This gives him the opportunity to face Catalina once more, which results in a large firefight and Catalina's death.

In addition to the exploits of the game's player character, the storyline, while not as integral to the game as its sequels, depicts the character development of several non-player individuals and bosses, through cut scenes before the start of each mission, as the player progresses though the game. Most of the characters encountered revolve around corruption, crime and a fictional drug called "Spank," which is a growing menace in the city.

With the success of GTA III and its sequels, several of these characters or their relatives reappear in future GTA titles with major or minor roles, and their personal background expanded, particularly Leone family Don Salvatore Leone, media mogul Donald Love, Phil, the One-Armed Bandit, 8-Ball and Catalina.

Grand Theft Auto III inherits and modifies much of the gameplay mechanics from its predecessors, Grand Theft Auto and Grand Theft Auto 2, combining elements of a third-person shooter and a driving game in a new 3D game engine. The idea of using a 3D game engine in such a genre however is not new; the first game to combine elements of action, shooting, and multiple-vehicle driving in a 3D package was Body Harvest (1998), also developed by DMA Design, for the Nintendo 64. Publicly debuted in 1995 at Nintendo's SpaceWorld video game trade show, it was revolutionary for its time, but despite above average reviews, the game sold poorly. GTA III takes the gameplay elements of Body Harvest and combines them with the GTA series' open-ended game design to create a level of freedom and detail that was unprecedented in 2001.

On foot, the player's character has the additional ability to sprint (but is incapable of swimming), as well as use weapons and perform basic hand to hand combat; he is also capable of driving a variety of vehicles, (with the addition of watercraft and a fixed-wing aircraft).

A screenshot of Claude running with a pistol in hand (PC version)Criminal offences, such as carjacking, murder and theft will result in increasing levels of resistance from the authorities. If the player's "wanted" level reaches certain levels, the police, FBI, and army will respond accordingly. When the player character collapses from his injuries or is arrested, he will re-spawn at a local hospital or police station respectively, at the expense of losing all weapons and armor and an amount of money for medical expenses or bribes. While this is similar to previous Grand Theft Auto games, the player character is essentially offered unlimited "lives," as opposed to the limited number of lives in GTA1 and GTA2. This allows the player character to "die" as many times as he pleases, and render it impossible to indefinitely lose in the game.

A major feature in GTA III's predecessors that allowed the player to obtain cash by committing petty crimes has been downplayed in GTA III, encompassing only car ramming, vehicle destruction and pedestrian killing. The amount of money in the player's possession is no longer a requirement to unlock new areas in GTA III. Instead, the completion of missions and unfolding of the game's storyline are now responsible for this role. Additionally, the player is allowed to return to all unlocked areas of the city. However, as new areas open up, access to other, previously available areas becomes more dangerous or less accessible, due to hostilities from enemy gangs.

The interface of the game has been significantly overhauled. The player-centred compass is replaced with a separate mini-map that also displays a map of the city and key locations (safe houses and contact points) or targets. Armour and health levels are now indicated in numbers, and a 24-hour clock is added. Gang behaviour is no longer dictated by "respect" meters used in GTA2; instead, the player character's progress through the story affects his view in the "eyes" of gang members. As the player completes missions for different gangs, rival gang members will come to recognize the character and subsequently shoot on sight.

The game is set in fictional Vice City, which is based on Miami, Florida. The game's look, particularly the clothing and vehicles, reflect (and sometimes parody) its 1986 setting (with the packaging and artwork in particular owing a great debt to 1980s artist Patrick Nagel). In contrast to the gritty urbanism of Grand Theft Auto III's Liberty City, Vice City appears (mostly) clean and upscale, with golden beaches, waving palm trees, and vivid sunsets.

Plot
The player takes on the role of Tommy Vercetti, a Mafia hitman who has recently been released from prison in Liberty City after serving a 15 year prison sentence in connection with eleven contract killings. The Mafia family for whom he used to work, the Forellis, fearful that Tommy's presence in the neighborhood will heighten tensions and bring unwanted attention upon their criminal activities, ostensibly "promote" Tommy and send him to the titular Vice City to act as their buyer for a series of cocaine deals. During Tommy's first meeting with the dealers, they are ambushed by a group of machine gun wielding Colombians, resulting in the death of Tommy's body guards and one of the cocaine dealers, Victor Vance. Tommy narrowly escapes with his life, though in the process of escaping.

Tasked by Sonny Forelli with retrieving the money and cocaine and killing whoever was responsible for the ambush, Tommy sets up permanent residence in a beach front hotel. He makes contact with the Forellis only other connection in Vice City, a corrupt, coke-addict lawyer named Ken Rosenberg, who, upon hearing of the ambush, has holed himself up in his office and begun popping stimulants for fear of being killed in his sleep. Rosenberg nonetheless proves to be a vital connection, and through him, Tommy starts working with Colonel Cortez who in exchange for his services will find who organized the ambush. While working for Cortez, Tommy meets Lance Vance and forms a partnership with him and Ricardo Diaz, a Cuban crime lord and Vice City's most powerful mobster. After working with Diaz in certain assignments, Cortez informs Tommy that he has learned Diaz was the one who organized the ambush. Tommy and Lance plan to take Diaz out together.

However, Lance tries to do the job himself. He is captured and tortured by Diaz, but rescued by Tommy. After helping Cortez escape from the French government, Lance and Tommy set off to kill Diaz. Tommy and Lance storm Diaz's mansion, take out his men, and kill him in his office.

With Diaz dead, his empire quickly crumbles. Tommy and Lance personally take over all of Diaz's old businesses, not only becoming Vice City's kingpins, but also seizing the assets of several near-bankrupted companies. Among those businesses are the Interglobal Films Studio run by Steve Scott, Kent Paul's Malibu Club, Vice City Print Works, Kaufman Cabs Agency, Vice City Harbor, and Maude Hanson's Cherry Popper Ice Cream Factory. They also gain favor from heavy metal band Love Fist, the Cuban and Biker gangs, and Avery Carrington's real estate enterprise.

All of these properties and businesses are acquired with no assistance from the Forelli family. Instead, Tommy becomes the head of his own organization, the Vercetti Gang. The more powerful and rich Tommy and Lance become, however, the more Lance begins to exhibit paranoid and sociopathic behaviors, to the point that he begins to physically abuse his own bodyguards and constantly calls Tommy in states of hysteria.

Eventually, the Forellis find out that Tommy has taken over crime in Vice City, cutting them out completely. The Forelli's send collectors to force money out of Tommy's assets, but Tommy murders them. An angered Sonny Forelli arrives in Vice City with a small army of Mafioso and street thugs, intent on wiping out Tommy once and for all. When Sonny and his henchmen arrive at Vercetti Estate, Tommy attempts to bribe them with counterfit money he made with Earnest Kelly. However, Lance, having come to resent Tommy's substantial share of their profits, betrays Tommy and allies himself with the Forellis. In the game's climax -- a pastiche on the end of the Brian De Palma film Scarface -- Lance, Sonny, and Sonny's henchmen raid Tommy's mansion. Tommy kills Lance in a firefight on the mansion's roof. Tommy then storms back downstairs where he faces off with Sonny. Sonny reveals he is the one who set Tommy up and had him kill the eleven men who were expecting him. Tommy faces off against Sonny, eventually killing him as well. His enemies vanquished, Tommy establishes himself as the undisputed crime kingpin of Vice City, with Ken Rosenberg as his right-hand-man.

Vice City features dozens of characters, many appearing only in the cut scenes which describe each mission. The voice-talent includes Ray Liotta as protagonist Tommy Vercetti, Tom Sizemore as Sonny Forelli, Robert Davi as Colonel Juan García Cortez, William Fichtner as Ken Rosenberg, Danny Dyer as Kent Paul, Dennis Hopper as Director Steve Scott, Burt Reynolds as Avery Carrington, Luis Guzmán as Ricardo Diaz, Miami Vice star Philip Michael Thomas as Lance Vance, Danny Trejo as Umberto Robina, Gary Busey as Phil Cassidy, Lee Majors as "Big" Mitch Baker, Fairuza Balk as Mercedes Cortez, and actress Jenna Jameson as Candy Suxxx. The voice of the taxi dispatcher is provided by Blondie singer Debbie Harry.

Although the main character is not the same as the one in Grand Theft Auto III, Vice City contains a few characters from GTA III at an earlier point in their lives. Donald Love, a business tycoon in GTA III, makes an appearance as an apprentice to real estate mogul Avery Carrington. The one-armed Phil Cassidy from GTA III appears in Vice City as well, and one mission actually explains when and how he lost his arm.

Several of GTA III's radio hosts can also be heard in Vice City: Lazlow, who was the host of Chatterbox, the talk radio station in GTA III, is the DJ for the hard-rock station, V-Rock, in Vice City (he mentioned in passing in GTA III that he used to be a DJ on a rock station). Toni, the burned-out, female disc jockey of Flashback 95.6, the 1980s music radio station in GTA III, also appears as a young, club-hopping DJ in Vice City's pop music station, Flash FM. Finally, Fernando, a self-glorifying procurer of women ("not a pimp... a savior," he claims) who appeared on Lazlow's show in GTA III, runs Emotion 98.3.

Because Vice City was built upon Grand Theft Auto III, the game follows a largely similar gameplay design and interface with GTA III with several tweaks and improvements over its predecessor. The gameplay is very open-ended, a characteristic of the Grand Theft Auto franchise; although missions must be completed to complete the storyline and unlock new areas of the city, the player is able to drive around and visit different parts of the city at his/her leisure and otherwise, do whatever they wish if not currently in the middle of a mission. Various items such as hidden weapons and packages are also scattered throughout the landscape, as it has been with previous GTA titles.

Players can steal vehicles, (cars, boats, motorcycles, and even helicopters) partake in drive-by shootings, robberies, and generally create chaos. However, doing so generally attracts unwanted and potentially fatal attention from the police (or, in extreme cases, the FBI and even the National Guard). Police behavior is mostly similar to Grand Theft Auto III, although police units will now wield night sticks, deploy spike strips to puncture the tires of the player's car, as well as SWAT teams from flying police helicopters and the aforementioned undercover police units, à la-Miami Vice.

A new addition in the game is the ability of the player to purchase a number of properties distributed across the city. Some of these are additional hideouts (essentially locations where weapons can be collected and the game saved). There are also a variety of businesses called "assets" which the player can buy. These include a film studio, a dance club, a strip club, a taxi company, an "ice-cream delivery business" (acting as a front company), a boatyard, a printing works, and a car showroom. Each commercial property has a number of missions attached to it, such as eliminating the competition or stealing equipment. Once all the missions for a given property are complete, the property will begin to generate an ongoing income, which the increasingly-prosperous Vercetti may periodically collect.

Police trouble, PC version.Various gangs make frequent appearances in the game, some of whom are integral to story events. These gangs typically have a positive or negative opinion of the player and act accordingly by shooting at the player or following him. Shootouts between members of rival gangs can occur spontaneously and several missions involve organized fights between opposing gangs.

Optional side-missions are once again included, giving the player the opportunity to make pizza deliveries, drive injured people to a hospital with an ambulance, extinguish fires with a fire truck, deliver passengers in a taxi, and be a vigilante, using a police vehicle to kill criminals. Monetary rewards and occasional gameplay advantages (e.g. increased health and armor capacity and infinite sprinting) are awarded for completing different difficulty levels of these activities. Different sums of money (depending on height, flips, etc.) are awarded for landing trick jumps in motorcycles and/or fast cars.

San Andreas is structured similarly to the previous two games in the series. The core gameplay consists of elements of a third-person shooter and a driving game, affording the player a large, open environment in which to move around. On foot, the player's character is capable of walking, running, swimming (the first GTA game in which swimming is possible), climbing and jumping, as well as utilizing weapons and basic hand to hand combat. Players can steal and drive a variety of vehicles, including automobiles, boats, airplanes, helicopters, trains, tanks, motorcycles and bikes.

The open, non-linear environment allows players to explore and choose how they wish to play the game. Although storyline missions are necessary to progress through the game and unlock certain cities and content, they are not required, as players can complete them at their own leisure. When not taking on a storyline mission, players can free-roam. However, creating havoc can attract unwanted and potentially fatal attention from the authorities. The more chaos caused, the stronger the response: police will handle "minor" infractions (attacking people, pointing guns at people, stealing cars, killing a few people, etc.), whereas SWAT teams, the FBI, and the military respond to higher wanted levels.

The player can also partake in a variety of optional side missions. The traditional side missions of the past games are included, such as dropping off taxi cab passengers, putting out fires, driving injured people to the hospital and fighting crime as a vigilante. New additions include robbery missions, pimping missions, truck and train driving missions requiring players to make deliveries on time, and driving/flying/boating/biking schools, which help players learn skills and techniques to use in their corresponding vehicles.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas takes place within the fictional state San Andreas, which is based on sections of California and Nevada. It is comprised of three major fictional cities: Los Santos corresponds to real-life Los Angeles; San Fierro corresponds to real-life San Francisco; and Las Venturas and the surrounding desert correspond to real-life Las Vegas and the Nevada desert.Players can climb the half-mile (800 m) tall Mount Chiliad (based on Mount Diablo), parachute from various peaks and skyscrapers, and visit 12 rural towns and villages located in three counties: Red County, Flint County, and Bone County. Other notable destinations include Sherman Dam (based on the Hoover Dam), a large secret military base called Area 69 (based on Area 51), a microwave dish, and many other geographical features. San Andreas is 13.9 square miles (36 square kilometers), almost four times as large as Vice City, and five times as large as Liberty City. While its predecessors' areas were limited to urban locations, San Andreas includes not only large cities, but also the rural areas between them.

Like its real-life counterpart of Los Angeles, Los Santos is comprised of several diverse areas. This includes the gang-ridden neighborhoods of Ganton, Willowfield, Jefferson, Idlewood and East Los Santos, based on their actual counterparts of Compton, Willowbrook, Watts, Inglewood, and East Los Angeles, respectively. Also located in the city is a busy downtown section based on Downtown Los Angeles; the wealthy Rodeo and Mulholland districts (Rodeo based on Beverly Hills and named after Rodeo Drive); the beach-side districts of Santa Maria Beach and Verona Beach, representing Santa Monica and Venice Beach; and the glitzy Vinewood and the giant Vinewood Sign are based on Hollywood and its Hollywood Sign. Los Santos features landmarks reminiscent of Los Angeles, which include the Watts Towers, the Los Angeles Convention Center, the Capitol Tower, the Los Angeles City Hall, the U.S. Bank Tower, the Griffith Observatory, the Forum, the Santa Monica Pier, the Vincent Thomas Bridge, Rodeo Drive, the Hollywood Walk Of Fame, the Westin Bonaventure Hotel, and Grauman's Chinese Theater.

Like its real-life counterpart of San Francisco, San Fierro is characterized by a prominent cable car system and hilly terrain. San Fierro features several interpretations of many of San Francisco's districts and landmarks, including the Haight-Ashbury district (Hashbury), the Castro district (Queens), Chinatown, and the Golden Gate Bridge (Gant Bridge). Several other familiar landmarks have been recreated, from the Embarcadero clock tower and the Transamerica Pyramid (Big Pointy Building) to Lombard Street (Windy Windy Windy Windy Street), and the San Francisco Bay Bridge (Garver Bridge). San Fierro's City Hall closely resembles San Francisco's ornate city hall. San Fierro also contains remains of the Cypress Street Viaduct which collapsed in 1989 during the Loma Prieta earthquake. There is also an aircraft carrier in San Fierro, docked at the naval base.

The characters that appear in San Andreas are relatively diverse and relative to the respective cities and locales which each of them based himself in. This allows the game to include a significantly wider array of storylines and settings than in Grand Theft Auto III and Vice City. The player controls Carl "CJ" Johnson, a young African-American gang member.

The Los Santos stages of the game revolve around the theme of the Grove Street Families gang fighting with the Ballas and the Vagos for territory and respect. East Asian gangs (most notably the local Triads) and an additional Vietnamese gang are evident in the San Fierro leg of the game, while three Mafia families and the Triads who all own their respective are more prominently featured in the Las Venturas section of the game.

Like the previous two GTA games, the voice actors of San Andreas include notable celebrities, such as David Cross, Andy Dick, Samuel L. Jackson, James Woods, Peter Fonda, Charlie Murphy, Frank Vincent, Chris Penn, Danny Dyer, Sara Tanaka, rappers Ice T, Chuck D, Frost, MC Eiht and The Game and musicians George Clinton, Axl Rose and Shaun Ryder.

Young Maylay makes his debut as the protagonist, Carl.

After living in Liberty City for five years, Carl "CJ" Johnson returns home to Los Santos for his mother's funeral. There, he finds his family and gang, the Grove Street Families, in disarray. While ironing out issues with his fellow gang members and fighting enemy gangs for territory within the city, Carl begins to bring the Grove Street Families back to prominence. However, with the Families on the cusp of retaking control of Los Santos, he discovers that his best friends, Big Smoke and Ryder, are working with the crooked Officer Frank Tenpenny and Grove Street's rival gang, the Ballas. Smoke and Ryder set a trap and help the Ballas ambush Sweet, Carl's brother. Tenpenny sends the police to arrest Sweet and kidnap Carl, whom Tenpenny ditches in the distant rural countryside. Carl, realizing Tenpenny is his only hope of staying out of jail or getting Sweet released, continues to run the cop's crooked errands, in the process killing or discrediting people involved in building a criminal case against Tenpenny.

Carl steadily befriends new allies, among them blind Chinese Triad leader and businessman Wu Zi Mu, an old hippie called The Truth, and Cesar Vialpando, a Hispanic gang member who, like Carl, has been betrayed by his old friends. Carl and his friends open a garage in San Fierro while they wait for an opportunity to return to Los Santos. After finding and killing Ryder, Carl becomes immersed in the affairs of a shady government agent, Mike Toreno, who implies that he will release Sweet if Carl helps him with his covert operations. Then, Carl works alongside Wu Zi Mu to promote the growth of a new in the mafia-run Las Venturas. Consequently, Carl enjoys newfound wealth and eventually returns to Los Santos. Toreno makes good on his earlier promise to release Sweet, but much to Carl's surprise, his brother wants no part of Carl's new lifestyle. Sweet insists on returning to the hood and working to reestablish the GSF rather than rest on the laurels of Carl's success.

Tenpenny goes to trial for several felonies, but the charges are dropped for lack of evidence, as all the prosecution's witnesses are either missing or dead. Tenpenny's release sends the citizens of Los Santos into a citywide riot, similar to the 1992 Los Angeles Riots. Fueled by Sweet's resolve to topple Big Smoke, who has become the city's biggest drug kingpin, Carl reacquires lost gang territory and hunts down the traitors responsible for pushing drugs that destroyed the Families. He kills Big Smoke in a shootout, escapes from the burning crack palace and Tenpenny shows up and flees with Smoke's drug fortune. Sweet and Carl pursue Tenpenny through the streets of Los Santos in a car chase. Tenpenny loses control of his firetruck, and he drives it off a bridge. Carl is about to shoot him, "just to make sure it's finally over," but is stopped by Sweet. Sweet simply tells him, "It's just a cop that died in a car accident." Tenpenny then dies from his injuries. The final scene shows the Johnson family reunited. As his friends and allies celebrate their success, Carl turns to leave. When asked where he's going, he replies, "Fittin' to hit the block, see what's happening."

The ways to get from island to island have also been tweaked. A ferry now runs from Portland Island to Staunton Island, and the tunnel that connects the islands in Grand Theft Auto III has not yet been completed - only the section of the tunnel that runs from north Shoreside Vale to south Shoreside Vale is open. The Callahan Bridge (the bridge that was blown up at the beginning of Grand Theft Auto III) has also not been fully constructed yet. Only after the mission "Driving Mr. Leone", which occurs at around 19% completion, can the player actually traverse the bridge as its construction progresses.

In addition, motorcycles were previously permitted in the city. The official Liberty City Stories website reveals that motorbikes were banned by the turn of the 21st century, due to a public ordinance supported by the Maibatsu Corporation (which marketed the over-sized Maibatsu Monstrosity in GTA III) in order to promote the use of automobiles in the city.

Though airplanes and helicopters can be found in Vice City, planes can be found in the airport and helicopters in hospitals, police departments or radio stations.

Vice City Stories is structured similarly to other releases from the Grand Theft Auto series.

The core gameplay consists of elements of a third-person shooter and a driving game, affording the player a large, open environment in which to move around. On foot, the player's character is capable of walking, running, swimming and jumping, as well as utilizing weapons and basic hand to hand combat. Players can steal and drive a variety of vehicles, including automobiles, boats, airplanes, helicopters, jetskis, and motorcycles.

The open, non-linear environment allows players to explore and choose how they wish to play the game. Although storyline missions are necessary to progress through the game and unlock certain areas and content, they are not required, as players can complete them at their own leisure. When not taking on a storyline mission, players can free-roam and create havoc (e.g. drive-by shootings, robberies, etc). However, doing so can attract unwanted and potentially fatal attention from the authorities. The more chaos caused, the stronger the response: police will handle minor infractions, whereas undercover cops, SWAT teams, the FBI, and the military respond to higher wanted levels.

The player can also partake in a variety of optional side missions. The traditional side missions of the past games are included, but have been moderately upgraded and enhanced compared to previous titles. A new addition to the game is "B