Grand Theft Auto III -- Hooked From The First Time I Played/Welcome to Liberty City

Intro

I was first introduced to the game back in the Summer of 2002 and I was hooked on it the moment I started playing because of the ability to do a wide range of missions, go around causing trouble, roaming around freely exploring or killing, and go joy riding.

Plot*


The unnamed character (that you play in this game) is double-crossed by his partner/girlfriend, Catalina, during a bank robbery and sent to jail. During his transfer, an attack on the police convoy aimed at kidnapping a different unrelated prisoner sets him free.

The unnamed 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 show a liking to him, and saves him from a Mafia death trap, while remaining close to him throughout the storyline. Eventually, his exploits attract the attention of Catalina, now affiliated with a Colombian drug 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. Maria was rescued, but was suggestively killed by the unnamed character (that you play) at the end of the storyline, when Maria, overly excited, would not stop talking to him.

Game Play

The game play is absolutely great.

My favorite mission in the game is Diablo Destruction, where you take radio controlled cars rigged with explosive that blows up when you hit a car or by pressing the circle button.

I also enjoy playing the vigilante mission with the Rhino (tank) or police car. The objective is to kill as many criminals on the run.

The taxi mission is also a lot of fun running people to different destinations as quickly as possible to get a chance at getting a speed bonus on top of the cab fee.

You can go around causing mayhem in general such as stealing cars and killing people by various guns such as fully automatic gun, flame thrower, grenades, bazooka, nine millimeter gun (something like it), and a sniper rifle.

One of my favorite tactics for using the sniper rifle and bazooka (at the first police station by the hospital) is to use tanks as a barrier to prevent police from being able to get close to you while taking out police helicopters, police cars and police officers or people in general. Be sure to do this with full armor and full health and have the codes for them handy or memorized so that you will not be killed. Do not forget to load up on ammo by using the Weapons Cheat.

There is ramps set all around the city in various locations so that you can do stunts and earn cash. My favorite jump so far was flying all the way up to the on the above ground up a couple of stories onto the train tracks…it also kind of was not cool since I did not collect any money for doing the jump.

The first mission is to get to the garage without getting stopped by the police it is rather easy as long as you can drive decently.

Some missions you are a hit man killing off rival gang members or the head honchos.

Other missions you are disposing of criminal evidence by dumping a car into sea or by placing car to be destroyed by the crusher.

There is a mission of racing against others to different checkpoints. And you will need the Banshee the fastest car available at the time and is a convertible that has a slight resemblance of a length-wise stretched 1957 Corvette.

Other missions that is my favorite and not the easiest to complete is boosting cars for gang use and you have to get the cars from specified locations on a couple of these missions. This type of mission is rather difficult because most of them you are required to boost (steal) the car and bring it back undamaged.

And after that most of the game play is about killing off rival gang members and betraying former gangs that you worked for. From there it only gets harder to play.

Graphics

The graphics for coming out of 2001 were about as good as one could expect coming from Play Station 2. The graphics do have errors where you can fall into a corner or inside the tank and not be able to get out of it…you either have to blow yourself up or reset the game that is why I would recommend having the cheat code for weapons handy rather than having to reset the game. The graphics are somewhat outdated but by no means are they pixilated…the graphics are smooth and continuous

Recommended Cheats

Full Health Cheat: put the following code during game play: R2, R2, L1, R1, Left, Down, Right, Up, Left, Down, Right, Up

Full Armor Cheat: put the following code during game play: R2, R2, L1, L2, Left, Down, Right, Up, Left, Down, Right, Up

All Weapons Cheat: put the following code during game play: R2, R2, L1, R2, Left, Down, Right, Up, Left, Down, Right, Up

Money Cheat: put the following code during game play: R2, R2, L1, L1, Left, Down, Right, Up, Left, Down, Right, Up

Wanted Level Down Cheat: put the following code during game play: R2, R2, L1, R2, Up, Down, Up, Down, Up, Down

Rhino (Tank) Cheat: put the following code during game play: Circle Six times, R1, L2, L1, Triangle, Circle, Triangle

Warning any other cheats that I have not listed I have had problems with saving a file that has become un-useable!

Why Use Cheats

Well to be honest some missions simply just can not be accomplished unless you have the proper weapons and a flak jacket (bullet resistant vest). Some areas are so hot with violence that you literally would be killed in seconds without proper weapons and the flak jacket. Now having explained that, you should always at the very least always have the armor and weapons cheat handy or memorized.

Final Thoughts

I would recommend this game to anyone who likes to drive and do various types of missions of mayhem, murder, and destruction. For its time it was one of the best games for many years that is challenging and has great replay value. I am happy that my friend introduced me to this game and finally getting a copy of my own encouraged me to buy one of the newer Play Station 2 since I had the money finally to get a PS2 for myself. And I am happy that I finally got a PS2 since I like playing games before I go to sleep since it helps me relax.

Copyright April 12, 2007




*Plot was inspired and paraphrased from Wikipedia due to difficulty in explaining and detailing the plot due to lack of documenting during game play.