"Absolutely Amazing."

Last year, Rockstar released its most ambitious title in the Grand Theft Auto series yet, GTA: San Andreas. San Andreas took everything that Vice City built upon, and expanded it even more with swimming, jets, fully customizable clothing, girlfriends, eating, working out, and expanded the map to astronomical proportion. Though content is always more than welcome, GTA: SA just added too much, too soon, and it left the game with a very hollow and boring feel outside of story missions and ultimately did not feel like a GTA game at all.

Flash forward to today, and on the PSP. From a purely content point of view, GTA: Liberty City Stories is a step back from the PS2 giant of last year. However, in almost every regard, GTA: LCS is truly just a step back in the right direction.

The story of GTA: LCS has you assuming the role of Toni Cipriani(a mafia boss for whom you worked for in GTA3) after returning back to Liberty City from lying low after performing a hit for his Don, Salvatore Leone. Despite this great personal favor he did for the Salvatore, he is greeted with a less than flattering welcome, and is put under the command of Vincenzo Cilli.

You'll be working back up from the bottom, taking jobs from several different bosses to shape things in the favor of yourself, and for the good of the Leone Mafia family. Your employers range from mafia big shots, strip club owners, psychotic business men, sneaky reporters, yakuza, and most importantly, the Don himself. Though generally very good, the story here isn't as robust or endearing as the story found in GTA: SA. The story in GTA: LCS is genuinely criminal, and without giving anything away, your employers often end your contract in unfulfilling ways.

The gameplay of GTA: LCS is almost exactly the same as it was in GTA: Vice City, with some of the old elements of GTA3 remaining dominant. Firstly, there is no property to buy in this game. Rather, it uses GTA3's system of three safe houses(one on each island). There are also no flyable vehicles to be flown freely, which is a technical step back from the last two installments(though, one that pleases me). Though, motorcycles do make an appearance in this installment(unlike GTA3), and a new mode of transport has been added in the way of car ferries.

The weapon system is identical to the one in GTA: VC. There are several weapons in each category, and you can only hold one of each type, unlike GTA3 which only had one weapon for each category. Weapons once again all have auto aim standard(with the exception of the Sniper Rifle and Rocket Launcher) which can easily be used by holding R. While aiming, pressing left or right will cycle through nearby targets, and pressing down will bring you into a manual aiming mode. A white aiming rectile will appear in the middle of the screen, and you'll be able to home in on specific targets(people or otherwise), and holding L will slow the movement of your aiming rectile to give you more precise aiming.

The controls of GTA: LCS are generally good, and customizable. Like usual, running, sprinting, attacking/shooting, carjacking, and aiming are all relatively easy to do. There are a few quirks here and there with controlling Tony, usually induced from a shifted camera angle, but nothing major or constant. The camera can be freely controlled like usual, but only when standing still(due to PSP button constraints). This can lead to close calls, and some frustrating deaths, but the situations in which the game, not my playing ability, caused my death were very, very few.

Liberty City Stories' difficulty is fairly easy most of the time. Most missions are very simple, and are rather short. Every now and then, a difficult mission will arise and will force you to actually think to come up with a winning strategy, which, often times, will allow you to beat the mission giving you trouble with absolute ease. In otherwords, most of the difficulty is proportioned to the weapons you bring to the field, and when/how you use them as opposed to how skilled of a player you are. There are a few very tough missions(most of which are a blast to play), and the final mission is both difficult and fun and is truly a great way to end the game.

Then, there are the side missions and the possibility to mindlessly rampage. The side missions are of the same fare seen in GTA3 and GTA: VC for the most part, and the tedium and annoyance is back in full swing. Paramedic missions, Vigilante missions, Fire truck missions, and so forth, are all equally as irritating as they were previously, and still must be done if you wish to unlock some nice secrets and gain 100% completion.

Law enforcement is still as annoying as ever, as the police seem oblivious to everything around them except you. If you've played any previous GTA game, you know exactly what to expect from the police in this game. However, something worth noting is that it seems that shaking wanted stars is more difficult than it used to be, as often I found myself getting a one star warning on a mission then drove down to the other end of the island, stopped to meet a mission objective, then found myself pulled out and busted. The prejudice police are a very unenjoyable aspect of this game, usually, and help make it frustrating in both the story missions, and side missions. Thankfully, killing them on a random rampage is always an option.

Audio is as good as ever, and definitely a step up from GTA: SA. Guns sound big and powerful, car crashes are crunching and satisfying, and explosions give the resounding boom that we need to hear. The voice acting is extremely well done and is definitely on par with the standard set by the previous games in the series. The radio is once again a big part of the game(seeing as you'll spend a large amount of time driving). While the commercials and radio host skits are entertaining and exactly what we've come to expect, the soundtrack of GTA: LCS is rather bland and generally composed of unknown or original pieces of music; just like GTA3. Thankfully, Chatterbox is back with its host, Lazlow, but unlike in GTA3, it's only one of several shows on the radio station, LCFR. Past the quality of the radio, the quantity is rather limited. There aren't very many songs on each station, nor are there very many skits or commercials in comparison to the previous installments. Thankfully, Rockstar gives us the option to load custom soundtracks from our memory sticks via a windows program to keep our ears satisfied once we have exhausted the radio that they gave us.

While the overall package is amazing, the most notable achievement of GTA: LCS is the graphics. No other game up to this point has been able to show case the power of the PSP as well as GTA: LCS. Character models look fantastic, even better than they did in VC, and definitely better than the models found in SA. Every character looks wonderful, with fully constructed faces and moving mouths. Italian characters look Italian, Jamaican characters look Jamaican, and Japanese characters look Japanese. For the first time in a GTA game, the characters look truly distinct and ethnic, likely due to the PSP's hardware advantages over the PS2.

Cars look as good, if not better, than ever. Cars, while not moddable like in SA, generally look great. The sports cars look like the speed machines they are, and the station wagons look like station wagons. A detail worth noting is the game's support of real time reflections on the vehicles and streets. Unlike GTA3 where cars looked pastel or dull, the cars in GTA: LCS look fantastic and sleek. Driving past another car's tail lights will cause the red to shine off your car, and during the day the sun is constantly making every vehicle shimmer and glisten as if they were all recently polished.

The environment of Liberty City is for the most part identical to its counter part in GTA3. In otherwords, the buildings and landscaping aren't as brilliant or lush as they are in SA, but they definitely do the job well enough. There are also minor differences between Liberty City from GTA3 and LCS. Some structures have yet to be built, and other sections of town are present in LCS where they have been destroyed in GTA3. It's also worth noting that while the environments aren't the most technologically amazing, they do an excellent job considering this game's immense draw distance. This game does not use fogging at all to hide pop up simply because it's not needed; it's possible to see nearly forever past the horizon. The well constructed city, good looking characters, excellent looking cars and the huge draw distance all work together to bring forth an amazing and engrossing experience in Liberty City.

Overall, Liberty City Stories isn't perfect, but it's a definite step back in the right direction. Removing all of the elements from SA(both good and bad) was a smart move, and revisiting Liberty City is a more than welcome experience as it's definitely the best constructed environment in the GTA series. The story is very good(not the best the series has seen, however), and becomes a major driving force for progressing through the game. The game plays well and manages to make just exploration or mindless rampaging fun and exciting. The audio is delivered in a very masterful way, with huge sounding gunfire and explosions. Though the radio is a tad limited, this is entirely made up for and then some thanks to the custom soundtrack feature. And it must be said again, but this game looks magnificent. The graphics of this game help it bring forth a compelling atmosphere and becomes a completely engrossing experience. After the release of GTA: SA, I thought that maybe it was the GTA series and not just SA that was becoming stale and boring. However, GTA: LCS definitely comes to the plate with game on the line and pulls through without fail. Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories is at this time both the best game in the GTA series and the best game available on the PSP.

This game is a definite must buy: 9.6/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 10/31/05