In Grand Theft Auto, the player takes the role of a small-time criminal trying to make it big with the mob. Stealing cars, doing jobs for the gangsters and behaving generally anti-social are the way to success.

The action moves through six levels spread over three different cities, each based on a real US city: Liberty City (based on New York City), San Andreas (based on San Francisco) and Vice City (based on Miami). To finish a level, a certain score must be reached. Stealing cars and crashing into traffic, driving over pedestrians and killing cops all raise the score, but the big points are made through jobs. Answering phones or entering special cars brings mission assignments, from simple "ditch-a-hot-car" jobs to supporting bank robberies or carrying out assassinations. Completing a mission will raise the score substantially and also increase the score multiplier, so that completing the next felony will gain even more points.

Criminal behavior comes with a price of course: if policemen witness a crime, the player's wanted level rises. At the lowest level, a single police car might give chase, whereas at the highest level whole car squads hunt the player, the police set up roadblocks and shoot to kill. The only way to evade the cops is to find a respray shop and get a new paint job with new license plates. This costs money which is deducted from the score, however. But even dying or being arrested are not the end. The player has several lives, and ending up in jail simply results in being stripped of all weapons and armor and the score multiplier being lowered.

The entire action is viewed from a top-down perspective, which zooms out while driving a car, for a better overview at high speeds. The cities are many screens large and can be freely explored. Crates are scattered over the cities, which might include weapons (from pistols to rocket launchers), armor or other bonus items: extra lives, police bribes (used to reduce the wanted level to zero) and get-out-of-jail-free cards (used to retain score multiplier and weapons when busted). Dozens of different vehicles are available for the taking, each with unique characteristics: a bus will handle very differently than a sports car.

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Screenshots

Grand Theft Auto DOS You do not have to drive on the streets. Pedestrians have to watch out.

Grand Theft Auto DOS There are even motorcycles in the game (see on the right side)

Grand Theft Auto DOS When you're in serious trouble ....

Grand Theft Auto DOS At the phone booth you get your jobs.

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Promo Images

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Trailer

Alternate Titles

"俠盜獵車手" -- Traditional Chinese spelling
"侠盗车手" -- Simplified Chinese spelling
"Race and Chase" -- Working title
"GTA" -- Official abbreviation

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Part of the Following Groups

User Reviews

Leading the way	Daniel Saner (3423)
A mixed bag.	Tomer Gabel (4634)
Mayhem in the big city!	MaiZure (126)	unrated
Really Funny! Loads of Fun!	Andrew Morris (6)

[3 more reviews | review game]

Critic Reviews

Computer and Video Games (CVG)	Dec, 1997		100
PC Player (Germany)	Nov, 1997		100
The Retro Spirit	Feb 13, 2008	6 out of 6	100
MikroBitti	Jan, 1998	87 out of 100	87
Gamesmania.de	1997	85 out of 100	85
Gameplay (Benelux)	Nov 03, 1997	83 out of 100	83
The Freehare	Feb, 2007		80
GameStar (Germany)	Dec, 1997	75 out of 100	75
Digital Press - Classic Video Games	May 30, 2007	7 out of 10	70
Computer Gaming World (CGW)	Jul, 1998		40

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Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
Weird bug: Endless chases	1	Daniel Saner (3423) Oct 27, 2008

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Trivia

1001 Video Games

Grand Theft Auto appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Banned

Grand Theft Auto was banned from stores in Brazil.

Cities

The game takes place in the cities Liberty City, Vice City and San Andreas. These cities are also the showplaces of the following 3D games of the series.

Cover

When Take2 bought BMG Interactive, they re-released Grand Theft Auto in Europe with another box-cover, which looked more attractive than the previous one, which was quite boring.

Development

The original concept for GTA was that the player was supposed to be the police and he had to go around catching car looters, robbers, gang members and so on. In the late design stages, the team argued among themselves that it would be better if the players role be reserved. After a heated battle they all agreed on reversing the players role.

Doubled Player Glitch

Go to a bike, without weapons.
Press "ENTER" and hold "Ctrl" at the same time.
Take the car behind and smash the bike.
Now you will see a copy of your self.
Dont drive over him, you'll just die :)

Freeware Release

As a way of saying thank you to the many fans of the series, Rockstar released a freeware version of GTA on its website, http://www.rockstargames.com/classics/, updated to support the latest operating systems and Direct X software.

German version

When playing the game with German language settings, it is not possible to choose the female protagonists.

Police Trick

The streets of GTA maintain a finite supply of police cars in the face of escalating crime levels (largely thanks to the singlehanded effort of the player); an ex-roommate discovered that if you can put aside the gratification at delivering the coup de grace, blowing up their vehicles, and instead leave the coppers with barely-functional, heavily-damaged wagons, you can move through traffic largely with impunity -- whenever a police presence would be triggered, instead of dashing to the scene of the crime in powerful cruisers they would stagger on to the screen in the same fleet of dented Chitty-Chitty Bang Bangs you mercifully spared.

Should the police cars blow up, the department appears to instantaneously replace the exploded car with a brand new one with everything in top condition; cultivate their deprivation, however, and you can cause the entire force to limp along while you cruise by in the fastest ride that you can grab.

References

In Vice City, you often see clothes that have been hung out to dry above alleyways and roads. Some of the blankets say "GTA" or "CM" - the initials of artist Craig Moore who worked on the game's textures.
In San Andreas, one of the missions assigned to the player by Uncle Fu's crime syndicate is the killing of mob boss Don Traegeri. This is most certainly a reference to Don Traeger, who was involved in establishing publisher BMG Interactive in 1995.

References to the Game

The cover of heavy metal band Megadeth's album Rude Awakening features vehicles from Grand Theft Auto.

Awards

PC Gamer

April 2000 - #50 (tied with Caesar III) in the Reader's All-Time Top 50 Games Poll

Information also contributed by Daniel Saner, Itay Shahar, Kartanym, Karthik KANE, PCGamer77, Pseudo_Intellectual, Steve . and Zovni

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Related Web Sites

DMA Design LTD – Grand Theft Auto 1 Design Document (A 1995 design doc for the game (back when it was still Race'n'Chase). )
Grand Theft Auto (Official game website)
GTA at GTAGaming (Information site about all things GTA.)
IGCD Internet Game Cars Database (Game page on IGCD, a database that tries to archive vehicles found in video games.)
Rockstar Classics: Free Downloads! (The GTA game available as a free download from the developer's website (328 Mb).)
Wikipedia: Grand Theft Auto (Information about Grand Theft Auto at Wikipedia)