by Matt Kelly

Created on: June 17, 2010

Grand theft auto, produced by Rockstar Games, has caused controversy since its release on the PlayStation in 1997. The first installment saw the player plunged into the sprawling metropolis of Liberty City where they are encouraged to take a 9 to 5 office job filing important memos and contributing to a rich and full society. Only joking of course (but what a wildly popular game that would be!)

Liberty City is a world of seediness and criminality, the home of Car jacking, cop killing Harry Krishna squishing (Gouranga) mayhem, viewed from the safety of a top down vantage point.

While the graphics have come along way, the premise of San Andreas is familiar and will require the same wanton disregard for the law to progress through the criminal underworld.

The protagonist, Carl Johnson (CJ) is a young American who has recently been released from prison only to find his neighbourhood is overrun by the rival gang 'the ballas'. These purple clad hoodlums are selling crack on CJ's home turf (Grove Street and the surrounding area) and generally making a nuisance of themselves (you know what those naughty gangsters are like). It is down to Cj to lead the war against these pistol wielding pretenders to the gangland crown, and ultimately make his mark on the sizeable tri-city area that makes up the games setting.

The map is a huge and sprawling mixture of city, desert and countryside (with a fully scalable mountain 'mt chiliad' thrown in for good measure). The cities themselves are based on the mean streets of Los Angeles, the hilly and hippie influenced promenades of San Francisco and the glittery home of the slot machine (you guessed it!) Las Vegas.

You start the game in Los Angeles and have to wait until sufficient murder and mayhem has been unleashed before progressing to the latter cities. Each city has an airport (with flyable planes) a train station (and yes the train is jackable) a series of fast food establishments and a gym in which you can work out and learn new fighting styles.

It is mainly the games adoption of the eating/exercise system that sets it apart from previous titles. CJ must strike a balance between pigging out and working out lest he become a ball of gelatinous goo unable to see his toes let alone perfect an international bank heist! CJ's figure not only influences his appearance, but a heftier gangster will be slower and will tire more readily, while conversely a svelte, toned CJ will outrun the most persistent policeman and punch harder than Cassius Clay on a bad day.

San Andreas employs a familiar open ended mission structure which allows the player to choose what missions they do and when they do them (to a certain extent), although in reality you'll end up doing all the same missions anyway. Whether it be taking orders from a couple of bent coppers or running errands for an old 60's acid head there are plenty of missions to get through and on 100% completion of the game CJ receives a 50% boost to his health and armour and receives a rhino tank outside his home.

This is definately a stonker of a game, with so many neat little touches that it would take another 10 billion words to get through them all. For those of you who havent fallen asleep yet you'll be glad to hear you can pick up a copy for next to nothing, between £10-£20 depending on where ya go.

San Andreas is rated 18 and is available on PC and PS 2


Happy murderin "ya'll"





For those who want to know the minimum pc requirements are as follows:-

1GHz Intel Pentium III or AMD Athlon Processor
256mb RAM
64mb Video Card direct X9 compatible
8X speed DVD Rom drive
3.6GB Hard drive space
DirectX9 compatible sound card

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