Warning: The following is a review for the most disturbing, inappropriate and violent game of all-time.
- Paul Wong
- Northern alliance fighters look at local Red Cross workers carrying the body of a pro-Taliban fighter in a fortress near Mazar-e-Sharif, northern Afghanistan, yesterday. The first American to die in the war was killed at the fortress this week.<br><br>AP
For those who didn”t run off to mommy, here is what you can expect from Rockstar”s latest installment of their “Grand Theft Auto” series: Absolute carnage.
The game begins with your character set up during a bank heist and caught by the cops. Fortunately, while being transferred via armored truck, a group of bad dudes jack the cops that are escorting you, allowing you to make a getaway.
Upon escaping from the cops your quest to make it big in the crime world begins. Throughout the game, your character must seek out “jobs” from pimps, drug dealers and the Mafia. Jobs include escorting hookers, raiding drug cartels and killing off anyone the mob wants you to. Similar to games like “Crazy Taxi” and “Driver,” these missions are accomplished by driving around and following a map to get to your destination. What makes this especially fun is that you can steal and drive any car you see. This makes for a great variety of getaway plans, from hitting jumps with a squad car to running over everything in sight with an 18-wheeler.
But unlike “Crazy Taxi” and “Driver,” the game is not restricted to driving cars. While the insane car chases, drive-by shootings and back seat action with prostitutes (which replenishes your health) are good enough to be a game itself, the best elements of “Grand Theft Auto 3” are done on foot. When on foot, your character can do anything he wants: Stop traffic, steal cars and mess with anyone who gets in his way.
Saying that you can mess with everyday people is actually an understatement. While on foot, your character can beat the living crap out of the homeless, elderly and anyone else who dares to walk the mean streets of Liberty City. To make things more chaotic, your character has access to weapons that include various guns, a bazooka, a baseball bat and even a flame-thrower. While these weapons come in handy when trying to complete a mission, they can also lead to ridiculous cold-blooded murder.
While going on killing sprees is not the true objective of the game, it might be the most fun part of “Grand Theft Auto 3.” This is because as you beat and kill innocent bystanders, your police awareness meter moves up which leads to insanely fun police manhunts. One star on the meter: A few cops to deal with no problem. Two stars: More cops grab a shotgun. Three stars: A police helicopter bust out the “zook and take it down. Four stars: Armored trucks ram them with a fire truck. Five stars: Here comes the federal agents give them the flame-thrower. Finally, six stars: Bring in the Army and expect World War III.
With all this senseless violence and mayhem, “Grand Theft Auto 3” resembles some of the best known crimes films, such as “Scarface,” “Goodfellas” and “Heat.” This is further produced by the music and voices in the game. When driving around, you can flip through the radio dial to find several songs from the movie “Scarface” on Flashback FM. These tunes will have you singing out “Rush, rush to the yayo” in no time. Aside from Flashback, the game features a variety of stations including a hilarious talk radio station called Chatterbox. Aside from hearing decent tunes and talk radio, the stations include some of the funniest radio advertisements ever, most notably for Petsovernight.com, who “bring you little bundles of love in a box meow.”
As for the voice talents in the game, there are many notable actors who contribute to “Grand Theft Auto 3” making it more like crime movies. The voice talents include the likes of Robert Loggia from “Scarface,” Joe Pantoliano from “The Sopranos” and appropriate for this game, Mr. Blonde himself from “Reservoir Dogs,” Michael Madsen. With these actors and the unbelievable cut-scenes in the game, “Grand Theft Auto 3” ranks right up there with the “Metal Gear Solid” games for cinematic realism.
As for the graphics and layout of the game, “Grand Theft Auto 3” is both beautiful and big. In fact, your character can explore every nook and cranny of Liberty City, with each block of the city detailed to perfection. With such a vast city holding various missions, the game will have those able to stomach the violence playing it for months. For those interested in buying the game, pick it up now. Like other controversial titles, such as “Mortal Kombat,” “Grand Theft Auto 3” is beginning to receive bad press because of the impact it could have on kids. Recent occurrences of youth violence and complaints from parents are causing stores to pull this great game off the shelf.