Last August, GTA V reached the impressive number of 150 million units sold in the world, and became the second best-selling game of all time , just behind Minecraft.
The masterpiece of Rockstar is one of the first games that we can enjoy in three generations (was launched in 2013 at PS3, Xbox 360, we were able to play it again a year later on PS4, Xbox One and PC, and in 2022 You will reach PS5 and Xbox Series X) and it is already a global phenomenon.
It is the reference sandbox , the game that has occupied more covers and headlines, and the best portrait that has ever been done from contemporary society , including books and movies. And it is the last chapter in a story that began with GTA III, which today celebrates its 20th anniversary .
Indeed, we talk about the third installment of Grand Theft Auto. And do we forget the two previous games? In this report we are going to review what was the launch of GTA III on PS2 in 2001 , and how it changed our way of watching video games forever.
How the passage of 2D development in aenal perspective (this were Grand Theft Auto, GTA 2 and GTA London) to a 3D development caused the adventures in the open world to be established as a gender in itself, revolutionizing the market.
Sales multiplied by seven ( GTA 2 sold two million units, and GTA III reached 14 ) and was game better scored of the year , a 97 according to Metacritic, tied with halo Combat Evolved.
Before GTA III. The birth of the saga
Let s look at the exciting story of GTA III . And the first thing to point out is the role of the Houser brothers, Sam and Dan. These two young British, children of Actress Geraldine Moffat, had grown up watching crime films such as The Getaway (the version with Steve McQueen of 1971) or Get Carter, starring Michael Caine and in which his mother appeared .
His first steps in the industry occurred through a musical seal. Coinciding with the classes of it at the University, Sam Houser came to be part of the label BMG Music as a fellow, trying to take his first steps to become rock stars.
In BMG, not only had the opportunity to soak up the new ones forms of art that would end up influencing GTA (such as Tarantino s cinema) , but he embraced the opportunity to work on a new branch of the company, dedicated to the Video game development: BMG Interactive.
Keep in mind that this adventure begins with the arrival of the games on CD ROM, and a change of perspective; From then on the games were much more complex, and it was not just a product for children.
Mortal Kombat had not only shown that games could be launched with enormous violence, but there was an adult audience who consumed these video games.
This was how Sam began working next to DMA Design (study that had reached the fame with the launch of Lemmings) , in a title originally entitled Race n Chase, a game of Polis and CaCos that would end up being Grand Theft Auto, although at source we would be the police .
The first GTA broke molds for a change in the approach; For the first time allowed the player to be the bad of the story. And Houser s obsession was to get players to have absolute freedom to travel the city.
Race n Chase also introduced the level of search to limit the actions of the player. The greater our misdeeds were, more police units came out in our persecution, and also (thanks to the CD ROM) had a soundtrack with real instruments , engraved for the occasion.
You only needed a controversial advertising campaign, an appropriate name change to reflect the spirit of the game and let the specialized press prove the fun it was working for the mafia to spur on the sales of the game, and turn it into a cult title .
The first title sales were sufficient to promote the development of a direct sequel, and an expansion, GTA London, set in the British capital in the sixties.
The worst city of America
In 1998 Rockstar Games was born (recovering with the name the old musical aspiration of the Houser). But the point of inflection in this story would arrive when they received the first development kits for PS2, a year later. That machine was able to reproduce games on DVD, and to make real the SAM project: a GTA in three dimensions.
According to Aaron Garbut, Development Head on Rockstar North Pass to 3D completely changed the immersion experience, because suddenly you were within the world, not about it. This was greatly changed the way in which we should address The creation of the game.
To carry out the project, they licensed a foreign engine, instead of developing their own software. And armed with renderware began to give life to Liberty City, the darkest and most reverse version of New York.
To make the kind of things we wanted, we needed a physics engine that offered us a greater connection of the vehicles with the world and the objects that were in it says Garbut.
The idea of the houses was to recover all the references that had been relevant in their childhood, along with new series such as soprano, and make a product capable of competing with them, not only with other video games.
Liberty City, baptized as the worst place in America was a living city, in which the player had infinite possibilities. To give you a much greater entity to the project, video sequences were introduced with the game engine and The dubbing of actors like Michael Madsen (one of the Renovair Dogs stars).
The development was moved by ambition. And in Rockstar kept adding design elements to further improve the game. In addition to the 80 main missions, there were taxi driver or ambulance driver, changes in the climate, three very different districts and different stations of Radio with licensed topics that could be heard in the car.
Again Garbut clarifies that Now the players were inside of the world, not looking at it from above. And, of course, remember the enormous challenge that all this supposed. We are faced with all kinds of challenges. All this was at a time when the cameras in third person and the targeted systems of the games were still poling.
What do you remember as more complicated? Build a world on that scale and with so much detail in which you could also move freely it was something that, just, nobody had done, we were creating something of an unprecedented scale and magnitude.
GTA III had just marked the beginning of the genre of the adventures in the open world, and had done it without complexes. Giving the player freedom to do good ... and evil. Obviously, this also allowed some players to do barbarities, which did not take long to generate controversy in the media.
When we saw GTA III for the first time
Grand Theft Auto III was distributed by ProEin in Spain (now Koch Media). And it was presented with a fairly contained advertising campaign. Previous games had not reached great notes in Hobby Consoles, and we did not know what to expect from this release, which he fought in the Christmas period with other consecrated games.
However, our fellow Daniel Acal (Playmanía) and Sergio Martín (by Hobby) went to the offices of the distributor to see a presentation of the game and test the Preview version. The room was to burst, and a very unusual situation was given.
GTA III guide and tricks
The members of the specialized press did not stop playing, despite the fact that they had overcome the first missions , and the laughter and expletures could be heard, while they were dedicated to stealing cars and traveling Liberty City doing misdeeds to increase the level Search
The people of the second shift expected, surprised, while the first players were resisted to let go of the command (and this is not so usual when one is dedicated to trying new games almost daily). When they returned - as if they had heard Houser, they told us in writing it was a game in which you could do everything you wanted.
Maybe the affirmation was a bit exaggerated, but it is true that no game had reached that level of freedom, perhaps the closest thing we had seen was driver or super runabout. Of course, he took the outstanding, but the most curious thing is how mouth ear worked on the promotion.
I received calls and friends consultations asking for that game in which you can get off the car and walk around the city and the inevitable in which you can go with prostitutes and then steal them the money that ended up reaching the general media.
I can tell my first game as if it were yesterday: jazz music during credit titles, an afternoon of fog in Liberty City and a desperate fence of one of the armored police vans, through Callaghan Bridge.
That feeling that the city never ran out, and that you could interact with pedestrians and drivers. Or the whole afternoons looking for a precision rifle and a Patriot vehicle (the version of Hummer H1) to sow chaos. GTA III was a unique experience, that left an indelible legacy.
GTA III legacy in the industry
By the Rockstar itself, GTA III marked the start of a trilogy (GTA III, Vice City and San Andreas GTA) that we can enjoy again in a definitive edition for current consoles and next gen . Each of the games improved the formula above, without deviating from the pillars of the third installment.
With Vice City aerial vehicles were introduced, and a new map, inspired by the city of Miami. While San Andreas broke the technical limits of generation and introduced three cities, countryside and desert, a character which could alter both its appearance and its characteristics and countless minigames.
the price of the Definitive Remaster Edition GTA The Trilogy filtered
There were few companies that resistiesen to the spell to create their own worlds repeating the formula. Activision released two installments of True Crime, THQ did the same with Saint s Row, Electronic Arts is made under license from The Godfather and Vivendi Universal did the same with Scarface .
Sony itself tried to replicate the formula in a London realistic with The Getaway, Atari He tried Driv3r and 2K Games launched Mafia. It is rare to find a distributor who has not had its own open world game to the other side of the law. In fact, they were games that GTA type were called.
And all GTA III owe their mission structure, driving through open environments and reagents, mechanical vehicle theft and other features. But there are few games they got reflect characters with so much charisma.
Because Rockstar s triumph was not only technical. The company had earned an image of enfants terribles , something like the bad guys in the development . And in their games, the characters were a series of exceptionally well written losers style.
Guide and Tricks GTA San Andreas
We conquered their speech, their background and aspirations. Claude Speed, the protagonist of GTA III may not be as memorable as other antiheroes who have gone through the series . But do you not remember a capo Salvatore Leone mobster? To the head of the yakuza Asuka Kasen or Catherine and Mary, romantic interests both of Claude?
The game got the feeling that we had to move by the criminal world of Liberty City , and we discovered the intertwined relationships among its main actors. We showed a more adult and a twisted sense of humor, the adventures look. The games were no longer children.
And had advanced Sam Houser, he was one of the first games able to look at the face of other productions like Guy Ritchie film or series like The Sopranos, beyond video games.
Part of this, of course, is due to its soundtrack. Garbut again explains that sound stereos and helped us create this new space more immersive for players, while radio stations, music or talk shows, brought the experience of the world to another level.
And he delves into it. Whether it was to select existing music, like classical or pop Double Clef 80s Flashback, or even compose new songs for only some of the stations, how to approach music in GTA III it was a turning point in the series .
It was another of those elements that other companies took borrowed when developing their games open world.
The influence of GTA III within Rockstar
It s time to look back and review what GTA III meant within the Rockstar itself . The co-director of Rockstar North explains that GTA III helped us clarify our approach when creating games, and that s something that has been in all that we have developed (...) our priority is to create worlds and make them as credible, detailed and vivid as possible.
Garbut insists on these hallmarks that have been with the studio since. We want to create worlds that look like you re really living, that are dynamic and include many other characters.
The key to these universes is that it s not all a facade that comes to life around you and for you, but as real a place as possible, full of stories, characters, events and things funny and interesting do.
While we were creating GTA III, we felt that was the game that we had always wanted to play. We looked cool but we had no idea of the welcome they would.
Interestingly, during the promotion and development of the game I remember we showed at E3 and the other Rockstar title, State of Emergency, attracted all the attention. That was hard, but also helped to motivate us.
Finally, the game had an impact according to team expectations. Maybe you have the impression that something is good, but it is necessary to align the stars for leave a trace in the world globally. We are incredibly grateful that people liked as much as us.
The game marked a before and after within the company. Since then, we have dedicated ourselves to make that world more visceral and real. That brings depth and timelessness (...) I think we established the bases, the rules, the model ... that we help create a genre May others have followed .
It concludes with one last reflection: The true legacy of Grand Theft Auto III is yet to come. I think that with each title we give a big step forward and it is always exciting to see the next leap. Grand Theft Auto III supposed Beginning of our trip, but we have not done more than start.
Rockstar and Take Two Interactive are going to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of this game as influential with the GTA III reissue, along with GTA Vice City and GTA San Andreas , with both visual and playable improvements in GTA Trilogy Definitive Edition.
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