This Month's Most Viewed Games Tagged 'FPS, action, GTA' on The Great Games Experiment http://www.greatgamesexperiment.com/css/logo.jpg en-us Vice City is a loose prequel to the preceding game in the series, GTA III, which took place in the present day at the time of its 2001 release. 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 gently 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 purple sunsets.

The player takes the role of Tommy Vercetti, who has recently been released from prison in Liberty City. While attempting to re-establish himself within the Forelli Mafia family, boss Sonny Forelli sends Tommy to Vice City to supervise an important drug deal. At the exchange, masked gunmen kill three of the people involved in the trade (two Forelli henchmen and Victor Vance, Lance Vance's brother), stealing both the drugs and the money Tommy was charged with protecting. Vercetti narrowly escapes and informs Sonny, who demands that Tommy get back both the "product" and the money. Both Sonny and Tommy wish to kill those responsible for the theft.

Much of the action in Vice City concerns Vercetti's burgeoning criminal empire, spanning drug trafficking, contract killings, counterfeiting, and protection. The player progresses through the game narrative by performing a series of missions, most of which involve criminal activities. This takes Vercetti from being a small-time hood staying in a beachfront hotel to being the city's crime kingpin, but Sonny is looming over Tommy until he finally comes down to get his stuff personally. And in a shootout similar to that of the ending of the Brian De Palma film Scarface, Tommy Vercetti kills Sonny Forelli and his traitorous partner Lance Vance.

]]> 07 Dec 2006 09:15:20 Grand Theft Auto III (GTA III) is an action computer and video game developed by DMA Design (now Rockstar North), published by Rockstar Games in October 2001 (see 2001 in video gaming) for the PlayStation 2 video game console, May 2002 for Windows-based personal computers (PCs), and in November 2003 for the Xbox video game console. A part of the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series, it is preceded by Grand Theft Auto 2 (GTA2) and succeeded by Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (Vice City). GTA III is also the first in the series to be released on the PlayStation 2.

The game centers on a nameless criminal who was betrayed by his girlfriend in a bank heist, and is required to work his way up the crime ladder of the city, before confronting her and eventually taking his revenge. Like its predecessors, GTA III implements sandbox-like gameplay, where the player is given the freedom to perform various activities in a large city, such as completing missions, exploring the city, committing criminal acts, or completing side missions.

The game concept and gameplay, coupled with the use of a three dimensional game engine for the first time in the series contributed to GTA III's positive reception upon its release and became 2001's top selling video game. GTA III's success was a significant factor in the series' subsequent popularity; as of 2006, five GTA prequels set before events in GTA III have been released. GTA III's violent and sexual contents have also been the source of moral panic and controversy.

Grand Theft Auto III takes place in Liberty City, a fictional city on the East Coast (based on New York City and eastern New Jersey). The timeline of the game was intended to be set at the present time around the first release of GTA III, October 22, 2001; this was indicated by the Liberty Tree website, which included plot points that connect to events in the beginning of the game, in its last existing monthly entry, dated October 18, 2001.[7]

Throughout the story, the protagonist and player character is never named (though he is referred to by several in game characters as "Fido" or "The Kid"). The player character is also a silent protagonist, never uttering a single word.

]]> 07 Dec 2006 07:42:53 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (GTA:SA) is an action-adventure game developed by Rockstar North. It is the third 3D game in the Grand Theft Auto video game franchise and fifth original game overall. Originally released for the PlayStation 2 in October 2004, the game has since been ported to the Xbox and Microsoft Windows, and has received wide acclaim and high sales figures on all three platforms.

Set in 1992, the game revolves around the main character, Carl "CJ" Johnson returning home to Los Santos after learning of his mother's murder. CJ finds his family and his old gang, the Grove Street Families, in disarray. Over the course of the game, CJ gradually unravels the plot behind his mother's murder while working to reestablish his gang and exploring his own business ventures.

Much like the previous entries in the Grand Theft Auto series, San Andreas's critical and commercial success has not been without controversy; hidden content in the game resulted in the game's re-rating and subsequent removal from many retailers' shelves.

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 to move around in. On foot, the player's character is capable of walking, running, swimming, 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, 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 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 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 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 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.

]]> 07 Dec 2006 09:16:40 Grand Theft Auto IV is the upcoming tenth installment of the Grand Theft Auto video game franchise, announced to be released by Rockstar Games on October 16, 2007 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. It has been confirmed that GTA IV will run on the RAGE game engine, the same engine that powered Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis. The game is being written by Rockstar president Dan Houser.

Lazlow Jones, who has played the voice of the radio presenter 'Lazlow' in GTA III, Vice City, San Andreas, Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories, is labeled as part of the cast for the game. Also listed as part of the GTA IV cast is Navid Khonsari, who voiced the porn host in Max Payne and has also voiced characters in GTA games as well, including pedestrians.

Peter Moore, head of Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment Business division announced that Rockstar Games is working on two downloadable packs for GTA IV exclusively on the Xbox 360, which will probably be available within months of the game's release date. Moore described the downloads as "epic episode packs," and not just an extra car or character. A press release during the conference said that the packs would add "hours of entirely new gameplay" to the game. Industry sources have said that the packs will be almost as long as Liberty City Stories. There have been no details on pricing of the downloads revealed. The nature of exclusivity on these episodes is still in vague detail. It is possible that the Playstation 3 version may also include two of its own exclusive episodes as well as unlockable content unlocked by the PS3 version.

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