"Stories is an overstatement. It's just a story - but one hell of a game!"

Grand Theft Auto - full 3D, and portable, and it's in my favourite GTA locale. Surely, this is unreal? No, it's a reality, but not quite what I expected. It surpassed my expectations somewhat, but didn't match them in other ways...how? Read on.

Graphics - 9
Looking at a static in-game screen is bloody brilliant. When you're the only character on screen, it's bloody brilliant. When there's over 5? It begins to become quite slow (not "OMG, liek dis is da crud!1!" slow, but...). What can we expect from a handheld though?

Also, when Toni sprints, there's a little bit of blur on his model. Even in cutscenes, when Toni moves (and you're close up) you can see this eye-hurting blur.

But, in general the graphics are good - the models, the weather the cars...all very good. I only wish the cutscenes were in Widescreen...looks awkward filling the full-screen. The animation is decent, but nowhere near the "Jak" series.

Gameplay - 8
After San Andreas, the gameplay in this game feels limited - but, not as limited as even Vice City. The major things - eating and swimming and planes, are GONE. I guess they're good and not really badly missed. Eating? Annoying. Swimming? Not needed, really. Planes? Liberty City is too small, to be fair.

Everything feels as fluid as a console GTA game - perhaps the shooting isn't as hard, but that's good, considering it's a handheld game. All the cars feel different, all the weapons feel great - well, if you haven't played a GTA game before (where the hell have you been?) just let me some it up. It's simple, and absolutely f...er, awesome!

Multiplayer? Oh my God. Orgasmic. There are six types - a few one for alls and a few team based games. No Game Sharing ability, but it'll be easy to persuade a friend to get this game. The whole of Liberty is your playground, and there are 60+ characters!

Sound - 7
No where near the quality of Vice and San Andreas, but still some decent tunes. Also - they cut Chatterbox to a short show on a different channel! BLASPHEMY. Lazlow is still here though, thank God.

The only slight annoyance - knocking an extra point off - is the second or so gap between getting in the car and the radio starting - not on purpose, either.

Again, weapons and cars sound great - but, the voices don't sound natural. They sound like something I recorded on my PC - not the voice work itself, but the quality. The voice work is also brilliant.

--

But, with all these great things comes a price - namely the "-2 points" price. So...what?

Well, here's the Pro's and Con's list!

+ GTA!
+ Decent sounds
+ The multiplayer is brilliant
- Slightly awkward controls
- Some graphical complaints
- Lack of some of San Andreas' features

Still, though, an awesome game. This'll keep you going for at least a fortnight!

Buy/Rent

LSK.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/18/05