Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories

"If you enjoyed playing GTA III, you will enjoy coming back to Liberty City."

Having started my Grand Theft Auto gaming with III, this title was a refreshing return to a city that I had a lot of fun with in the past. Most GTA games were a blast to play, and you could spend plenty of time on each title if you were going for 100%. Even after completing the game, you still could spend many more hours just messing around, making GTA games one of the best titles out there.

Only a few GTA games were bad in my opinion. Those being San Andreas and Vice City Stories. VCS could have been saved if it wasn't for all the glitches that the game suffered from. San Andreas was just too large and felt more like a “Sims” game instead of a GTA title. GTA IV will be out later this year, but I'm not feeling any real excitement for it. This might be because of all the hate/problems that Manhunt 2 is getting currently. As of this writing, Manhunt 2 is being edited to meet an “M” rating instead of the “AO” (Adults Only) rating that was given to them. If a game like Manhunt is being attacked like this, who is to say that GTA IV won't have the same fate?

Presentation-

GTA continues to do well in terms of story telling and gameplay. Maybe I'm just the type of gamer who enjoys this style of gaming, but I can't get bored with GTA games. There is so much to do, that if you get bored doing one type of mission, you can easily go on to do something else. Or if you just want to cause havoc and death you can.

I'm very happy to see a map for Liberty City finally. III really needed a map, but didn't have one (besides the one that came with the game). Even though I knew where most items/buildings were located, it was just nice to pause the game and see the map. The camera adjust/view was updated so that the player could have full range of view by moving the right analog stick. I really liked this, since some GTA games either switched to first person mode to look around in, or had no view changes at all.

I am not impressed with is the lack of air vehicles. How come III had a plane to fly (very hard to fly, but it is there to use), but LCS has nothing? Sure, you can do some cheats to get a helicopter or another vehicle, but I want to find them just like I do a car or a motorcycle. I don't want to have to exploit a story mission and then hope that my garage can save it, or use some cheat device to make one appear. We get the addition of motorcycles for this city, yet remove helicopters?

I also feel that it took way too long to give your character the ability to swim. San Andreas was the first GTA game to allow us to swim and not drown. When they made LCS, they decided to keep the drown/death feature from III in the game. At least they wised up with Vice City Stories and let us swim in the water instead of die. 7/10

Graphics-

Since this game was ported over from the PSP, the graphics look very good on the PS2. I'm not the type of gamer who goes crazy if the graphics are poor, or if they are great. Just as long as the game isn't constantly freezing up/glitching on me, I'm fine. If you destroy a lot of cars in one spot, and other vehicles go to that area, you might experience some slow down.

The only time that I had the game freeze up on me was during Vigilante missions. For some reason, the game would freeze while I was in the tank and in one section of the city. It was on the second island (Staunton), and the area was near the casino. Don't know why it would freeze here, but it would. I could drive around in other spots with no problems, but would always stop and save after reaching a certain level…since I didn't want to press my luck and have it freeze in a new spot and lose those kills and the cash.

My garages in the game were very good, which is surprising for a GTA game. I think I only had one vehicle disappear on me, and so far my garage on the third island still has three cars in it. I feel that this game has the best garage system in any GTA title. 8/10

Sound-

I think that most fans of Grand Theft Auto games would say that the radio is the best feature to have while driving any vehicle. Just like in real life, having some music or listening to a talk show while driving can be relaxing. The music stations in LCS are decent. A few channels I would avoid, but most of the songs that each station plays are cool. The talk stations are funny, but I've heard better on Vice City or on Vice City Stories.

Regular sounds (cars, guns, etc.) are just as you would expect them to sound like. The voice actors during the cut scenes do their jobs well, and don't come across as cheesy Resident Evil line reads. Your main character Toni sounds perfect for his role. He is my second favorite GTA character, behind Tommy Vercetti from Vice City. 8/10

Gameplay-

This isn't just the old GTA III with new missions. A lot of extra content was added to make this game stand out on its own. I liked how the game used the exact same layout of III; since I played that game so much in the past I was able to remember where everything was.

The story missions had that familiar feel to them, but some parts were different. Instead of just going from point A to point B, the mission might be like this. Go to point A, but while you are going there, you are attacked or have to go to point C and then to point B. There are little differences in the missions to try and give them a fresh feel instead of something that the player has already done before in the past. The story behind LCS seemed like it was done before, probably in another GTA title. I guess you can only do so much with your story when it deals with car theft and gangs.

New to LCS is the ability to drive motorcycles. After playing Vice City, I enjoyed riding the motorcycles since you can avoid traffic much easier and get into smaller spots that cars cannot drive into. Plus using a fast motorcycle for unique jumps always helps. A few extra side missions were added to LCS, and they were very fun to do. One mission required you to drive a garbage truck around and hit the dumpsters in the time allowed. Another mission was to deliver Chinese food (like you did Pizza's in Vice City) on a moped. This one could be annoying at times, but not too hard. You also have a Pizza delivery game too.

Finally, you have my favorite new mission to play…car salesman. You drive the customer around and try to impress them to buy the vehicle before the time runs out. You have a motorcycle, racing car, slow car, and off road vehicle as your choices. Each vehicle has their own technique to get the sale, and if you do it correctly, you can earn some quick cash.

Also added to the game is the mission where you drive tourists around to see the sights. This is fun, and was quite different in terms of doing other GTA missions. Another very cool side mission was called “Slash TV”. You have to kill all of the enemies in a small room without dying. It felt like an extended Rampage almost, but with more excitement. Speaking of Rampages, there is a new mission that is done on each island. You team up with an Avenging Angel gang member and you fight crime. I liked this style of mission, even though the cops were a pain to deal with.

Along with the new side missions, you of course had the older missions. Vigilante, Fire, Taxi, Ambulance, Unique Jumps, Hidden Packages, Rampages, Import/Export. There are also races for you to win money with, using a car/motorcycle/RC. The game has plenty of side missions to keep you busy if you don't feel like doing the story missions. 9/10

Lasting Appeal-

I have around seventy hours on my save, and play this title about once a month just to mess around. If you plan on getting 100% in the game, then you will have around forty hours of gameplay at least. I wanted to get a higher ranking so I spent some time doing Vigilante missions, or just killing anything in my way and then taking out helicopters to get points.

Since the game allows so much for the gamer to do, you really can't say that the title doesn't have any lasting appeal to it…if you do, then you're just someone who hates GTA games period. 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/03/07