General_Norris wrote:Have to say, I never liked SA much, it had more stuff, it was bigger and bolder but it didn't quite clash together as well as VC did for me.
Yeah I'm going to agree with this. As much as I love SA and the amount of content offered... well it was just overload for me I guess, I never finished that one. Vice City I thought had better pacing and a cooler main story, plus SA had some incredibly annoying missions (anything flying related...). But yeah, they're both amazing. I was replaying SA last year on the PC for awhile and that was awesome, although a real pain mapping the controls to a controller, so many damn keys for that game lol.
I couldn't agree more as far as the flying missions go, I felt like throwing my controller through the screen on Zero's missions. I was so pissed when I found out they weren't required for story progression To answer the OP, GTA 3 will always be remembered as the game that kicked off the sandbox genre as we know it today, even if a similar formula was used by several titles prior.
I've always liked GTA 3 better than Vice city, maybe because i like the rainy, dark atmosphere of it more than the bright Miami setting. Even though the story is simple it's better than the nonsensical story in GTA IV. San andreas is the best game in the series. I don't see what's wrong with the flying missions, I never had a hard time with them, though on the PC version the flying controls are more difficult.
Actually, I think the pre-GTA III games are the ones that are forgotten. Whenever people mention Grand Theft Auto video games in general, they always start at III and never even talk about the "top down" ones, like they're bastard children that should have been put up for adoption.
MyNameIsVince wrote:Actually, I think the pre-GTA III games are the ones that are forgotten. Whenever people mention Grand Theft Auto video games in general, they always start at III and never even talk about the "top down" ones, like they're bastard children that should have been put up for adoption.
I tried the top down ones and couldn't get into them. I was always getting lost. Granted I've only played III, but I had a lot of fun with it. Will try VC and IV eventually.
MyNameIsVince wrote:Actually, I think the pre-GTA III games are the ones that are forgotten. Whenever people mention Grand Theft Auto video games in general, they always start at III and never even talk about the "top down" ones, like they're bastard children that should have been put up for adoption.
Menegrothx wrote:Since we are on the subject, do you think that the 2D GTA games are overlooked/underappreciated?
Werent there atleast a couple of GTA-esque games on PS1 and even on N64 too? The first driver game and Carmageddon atleast, but if I recall correctly, there were a couple of other 3D sandbox blowing shit up/doing crimes type of games before the PS2/GTA III. One where you could actually shoot pedestrians while walking/running around a city.
My WTB thread (Sega CD/Saturn games)
Also looking to buy: Ys III (TG-16 CD), Shadowrun (Genesis) Hori N64 mini pad and Slayer (3DO) in long box/just the long box
Anyone else remember how GTA 3 included a GTA 1/2 camera? You could play the game from a top down perspective if you wanted to. It's a shame they removed that option in the following games (though I think it might have had something to do with how the game world was rendered differently compared to 3 to save up a lot of processing power)
BoneSnapDeez wrote:The success of a console is determined by how much I enjoy it.
MyNameIsVince wrote:Actually, I think the pre-GTA III games are the ones that are forgotten. Whenever people mention Grand Theft Auto video games in general, they always start at III and never even talk about the "top down" ones, like they're bastard children that should have been put up for adoption.
I tried the top down ones and couldn't get into them. I was always getting lost. Granted I've only played III, but I had a lot of fun with it. Will try VC and IV eventually.
I know what you mean. The top-down field of vision is too narrow for me after playing III~IV. That said, I was kinda able to get into China Town Wars. It was pretty fun but the limited vision sucked for driving.
GTA III was an epiphany when it was released and while it deserves praise for essentially creating, or at least popularizing, the modern third-person sandbox game, its immediate sequels completely overshadowed it in terms of quality.
J T wrote:
I played GTAIII in its heyday. It was such a bold game. It was a big open world to be an antisocial psychopath in. And it took chances. The game design, the violence, the music... it was all cocksure and edgy. MSX is but one example, but the fact that they had an entire radio station devoted to drum n bass when that wasn't even a hugely popular style at the time just speaks to how the game was something that did whatever it wanted. It was like this big giant leap of a game that said, I'm doing something new and I'm doing it my way all the way. I love GTAIII for that.
I like Vice City, San Andreas, and GTAIV pretty well too, and while some of them were better designed, none of them compared to that first experience of playing GTAIII.
This. My roommates and I played GTAIII to death when I was in college. We played a little GTA:VC, but I ended up completing the game by myself. GTA:SA was released after I graduated, and - while I spent a fair bit of time with it - I have not yet completed it. (I still have my save file; so, I guess that I can go back to it at some point.) My point is that each GTA game after GTAIII felt like more of the same. GTAIII was such a ground-breaking title, and I cannot think of any game released since then that has such a profound effect on video game design.
I also like the fact that the protagonist(?) is silent since I think silent protagonists generally make better avatars. (Nintendo understands this concept, which is likely why Link and Mario never really say anything.) I also agree that the Rockstar's likely inability to use expensive licensed tracks resulted in GTAIII having the edgiest soundtrack of any installment in the GTA series. (KJAH and Double Cleff are my personal favorites.)
To answer the OP, GTA 3 will always be remembered as the game that kicked off the sandbox genre as we know it today, even if a similar formula was used by several titles prior.
