Reviews from

in the past


It's good but not the best in the series like people think it is.

It was my first GTA and I loved it. Wasn't really into hip hop and the culture behind it as a kid but this game got me interested in it. The humor is of course a product of the time and probably not everything has aged well but my 15 year old self was very entertained^^ I often just drove around, listened to the fantastic music and got up to some shenanigans, good times. I still check it out every now and then.

zerei ele somente no android, mas conheço tanto esse jogo que já conheço de tudo desse, já joguei tanto no ps2 só badernando mesmo, mas só joguei sério mesmo uma vez no android


Even though I played on android, it was a great experience. One day I'll play it on PC and I'll love it even more. Such a great game. I dare to say GTA San Andreas is the best GTA of the 3D universe (never played GTA IV so I can't judge on that)

played SAMP, roleplaying with friends

As a kid, would play only for the car "sex" scenes until my mom caught me.
10/10 traumatising

Não preciso falar nada,todo mundo conhece, muito bom, recomendo bastante (só não tenta fazer o 100% na versão de PS2, é muito difícil e massante)

I always asked my older brother to do the jet pack cheat code for me lol

It's definitely the best of the PS2 games. Solid narrative, great characters, and fairly fun gameplay. Still shows some of the jank from previous titles, but I think they really found their footing here.

In my opinion, this is the best GTA experience ever. One of the first properly realised open world games, the graphics and gameplay may not have aged well, but the story lives up still. The shenanigans you can get into is insane, the characters have personality and the story flows well. The world feels lived in and the gameplay loop is addicting.
The music fits really really perfectly and the radio is a loaded with great tunes.
The rags to riches story of a gangster takes CJ from the hood to las vegas like riches (literally). It was the most immersive experience of its time and even now you can play San Andreas and feel like you are CJ.
I absolutely recommend it to anyone who is ready to look away from the dated graphics. It is totally worth the (very long )playtime.

I still have big smokes order memorized.

Playing this without SkyGfx should be considered a crime

Samuel L. Jackson is in this game, just let that sink in.

Minha experiência com ele foi a mesma que todo mundo teve, não preciso falar muito sobre né?

its the best gta because it's the one i played as a kid

Played thinking I was gonna become a gangsta, end it up getting in love with country music, thanks Rockstar.

Saúde, colete e 150 mil reais

𝐎𝐁𝐒: 𝐀𝐒 𝐕𝐄𝐙𝐄𝐒 𝐐𝐔𝐀𝐒𝐄 𝐒𝐄𝐌𝐏𝐑𝐄, 𝐄𝐔 𝐏𝐎𝐒𝐒𝐎 𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐀𝐑 𝐔𝐌 𝐒𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐑 𝐀𝐈 𝐍𝐎 𝐌𝐄𝐈𝐎, 𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐎 𝐋𝐄𝐈𝐀 𝐏𝐎𝐑 𝐒𝐔𝐀 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐏𝐑𝐈𝐀 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐀 𝐄 𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐂𝐎.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA EU NÃO AGUENTO MAIS ESSE AVIÃO

Enfim partindo pra analise, então esse é o famoso MELHOR GTA se bem que o fator nostalgia ajuda muito, mas tudo bem não estou aki pra julgar você que acha isso jovem gafanhoto e sim essa bomba, começando aki só pra tirar do caminho a versão da steam é uma tremenda porcaria, como tiveram coragem de colocar algo assim pra vender é o bug puro.
Mas o jogo em si pode ser bem divertido, dirigir o carro nesse game por um tempo sem se importar com nada te da uma sensação muito boa e é nesses momentos que tu pensa na vida, os personagens são bem cativantes e engraçados, realmente parece que eles tem vida própria e não são apenas bots, o mapa é bem grande até, não tanto comparado a algum outro gta que veio depois dele mas é grandinho.
Agora a jogabilidade, MEU DEUS mas como é HORRIVEL CONTROLAR AVIÃO NESSE JOGO PQP só da estresse sem falar que não tem save no meio da missão ou pelo menos no começo dela, ENTÃO É ISSO MESMO QUE VOCE LEU ALEM DE PERDER OS ITENS CASO FALHE NA MISSÃO VOCE PRECISA VOLTAR PRA ONDE PEGOU A MISSÃO, SIM AMIGO ISSO MESMO TU VOLTA TUDO HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA...............
Respira
Sinceramente eu esperava mais , muito provavelmente minha mente tinha implantado que esse jogo era incrivel sensacional e etc, e de um certo modo ele é tu consegue fazer muitas coisa alem das missões mas muitas coisa são horriveis tambem, como trocar de roupa que demora muito pra ele mostrar como esta a roupa no CJ, AI MAS TEM MOD PRA ISSO NÃO SEI OQUE NÃO SEI QUE LA FODA SE, não estou levando em consideração mods, e sim o jeito que o jogo veio pra loja e da loja pra minha biblioteca de jogos.
Bem mais é isso o fator nostalgia ajuda sim tornar ele melhor na sua mente do que realmente é mas não me leve a mal não é um jogo ruim mas nem fodendo que supera GTA V. Antes que eu esqueça a história é bem divertida.

E não enche o saco falando que faltou isso ou aquilo apenas falo oque lembro que no caso é quase nada.

Enfim essa é apenas a opinião de alguem que ama jogar video jogos☝️🤓.


I had a buddy mention that Tony Hawk's Pro Skater II has the best soundtrack of all-time and ... yeah, ok. That's an incredible soundtrack but I said it's not my #1 and when he asked me, it was a flat-out easy answer: San Andreas. This is the only GTA game ever made where every single station and every single song on every station ... I enjoy.

Playback FM: 80's golden age hip-hop hosted by Chuck D? Aces.

K-Rose: Classic country? Aces.

K-DST: Classic rock hosted by dickhead Axl Rose? Aces

Bounce FM: Funk/R&B/Soul/Disco hosted by George Clinton? Aces.

SF-UR: House music? Aces

Radio Los Santos: 90's West Coast Hip-Hop hosted by Julio G? Aces.

CSR 103.9: New Jack Swing / Soul hosted by Michael Bivins? Aces

K-JAH West: Reggae, Dub and Dancehall? Aces

Master Sounds 98.3: Classic Funk / Soul? Aces

and for me, the king of all:
Radio X: 90's Alt-Rock / Metal. Every single song on this radio station, I own the album lol. Aces x2

No video game before or since has had a better soundtrack and I'm not really sure how it's possible on my end for it to be topped since it took some serious black-fucking-magic for every single song being one I enjoy.

This is the third in a series of reviews on the 3d era of the Grand Theft Auto games and it reference my previous 2 reviews on GTA 3 and Vice City. San Andreas is a fan favourite in the GTA franchise and was a cultural blockbuster on release. The game was a chart topper for the PlayStation 2 beating out both previous games and even Sony's first party releases in sales to become the best selling PlayStation 2 game of all time. What I’m trying to get across is that this game was a big deal and it set the course for Rockstar's future. I want to state up front that I think this game is a monumental achievement, it’s setting and story was a huge step up from previous games, it made meaningful changes to the GTA formula and I had a great time playing it, yet I also felt a sense of disappointment as all too often the game strayed from the intoxicating hands off mission structure that the previous two titles had. San Andreas will often lead the player by the nose and not only does the game reduce the amount of creative expression the player can do but it even goes so far as to actively destroy any chance the player might make in preparing for missions or engaging in creative problem-solving instead choosing a serious of linear scripted sequences which are lacking in a satisfying payoff.

Let’s start at the beginning; its the 1990s and Carl ‘CJ’ Johnson has been away in Liberty City for a while but at hearing the death of his mother he has come back to San Andreas for the funeral. Whilst visiting the his old neighbourhood and gang he becomes dedicated to building the gang back up and its here we meet the cast of characters and establish the setting. San Andreas is set on the West Coast in the 90s and it is reminiscent of gangsta films of the era like Boyz n the Hood or Menace II Society. Unlike Vice City, which was a straight rip off off one particular movie, San Andreas doesn’t really follow beat for beat exactly what happens in it’s filmic influences and instead chooses to take elements from their setting and portrayal of hood life to create a very dry and drab looking aesthetic, one that’s romanticised by the influence of west coast hip-hop where the streets are mean and crime is a way of life. Corrupt police stalk citizens and enable gang violence, different gangs not only beef with each other but there’s also conflict within families. This is a more thoughtful approach to building a setting and it’s fantastic. In the previous games I talked about the ‘rags to riches’ catharsis that comes from building up the protagonist to a very glorified kingpin and whilst San Andreas starts the player on the bottom rung in a neighbourhood of poverty and systemic violence it doesn’t glorify the crime life, tragedy, downfall and consequences strike the characters. San Andreas retains the feeling of progression from older titles but chooses to make a conscious effort to depict its setting and characters with a more tempered approach.

CJ is the best protagonist of the 3 games hands-down because he isn’t an unfeeling, reckless gangster but rather he is a person who at times displays sadness and amusement and anger and despair, he speaks to different characters in different tones. CJ might show respect to his family members and people who treat him well but he also has a playful side where he makes fun of his homies, he speaks coldly and impatiently to Tenpenny and the police officers who keep him on a leash. CJ is successfully established not just as an avatar of player chaos but deep down, a decent guy with a complex thought process, he sometimes comes across as very trepidatious and whiny and like he feels pressured into doing something to appear strong even when he knows it’s the wrong thing to do. This is praise that you cannot say about Claude or Tommy. I think a lot of credit should go to the brilliant performances of the voice actors who deliver a fun and enthusiastic performance from start to finish.

The starting area of the game, Grove Street is a triumphant expression of game design and makes you feel like you’re back in the swing of GTA. San Andreas has better movement mechanics this time around, CJ can crouch, climb, roll and swim and the starting area shows this off by placing a few weapons on rooftops, encouraging players to reach tangible and useful early game rewards by exploring and interacting with these new mechanics. One of the first things I would do upon returning to Grove was pick up a pistol, SMG and body armour, the golden combo of early game GTA. The game also improves on shooting mechanics, the controls are more like what you would expect from a third person shooter with a reticle and finer movement controls, the lock on is very powerful and in fact its almost too powerful, you can snap onto enemies very quickly with very little effort combined with the improved aiming you can absolutely blast enemies away or snipe them before they even notice you, but its an overall good change, it feels like a robust system that encourages you to use movement and cover intelligently.

It sounds good so far right? Good story, good setting and meaningful gameplay improvements aside the shortcomings of the mission design appear very early in the game when Big Smoke takes you on a mission to kill some Russian Mafia. By this point in the game I had done laps of weapon pickups and equipped myself with an MP5 and a lot of ammo for it, what happens next is a sequence where a mac-10 is forced on my character replacing the powerful SMG and all the ammo I had collected so that the mission could perform an extended turret sequence. Needless to say this was where I knew this game and I would start to clash. After the mission all the effort and progress I had put into preparation had been undone and I was left with a shit gun with one magazine, I felt betrayed by this and it was made worse by the scripted mission wasn’t even very impressive in its delivery, considering it resembled a climatic chase scene on a motorbike in a storm drain being shot at by black sedans and a semi truck (A la Terminator 2) it was decidedly flat with no music or impactful sound effects and marked by invulnerable vehicles that had to reach an area to blow up cinematically.

This mission represents a problem with the entire game, the player is not encouraged to figure out a solution to a mission but rather follow a series of instructions and set pieces. If you’ve spent some time picking up grenades a mission will force you to replace them with Molotovs to complete an arson mission, if there's a warehouse full of enemies they won’t spawn from one entrance and you cannot scout the area because you have to hit a trigger at the front entrance and go through the mission on a set course, this linear approach to missions completely clashes with the open world design remnants like ammo and armour pickups and I wasn’t even particularly motivated to look for fast vehicles or use the new vehicle customisation options because the vehicles were either expected to be blown up as part of the mission or the player is just provided with a car and told to drive somewhere. Contextual health and armour spawn in the middle of missions and red barrels are placed everywhere. San Andreas doesn’t want you to prepare and it doesn’t want you to experiment and this is such a massive let down after the feeling of having Grove Street teach you to explore for goodies, any sense of reward or satisfaction is killed stone dead when a mission demands I complete it a certain way.

Nowhere is this focus on narrative-at-the-expense-of-gameplay shown more clearly than the in car conversations you can have with characters; these conversations are themselves really great and I want to listen to them but all too often they conflict with the games scripted timing, I shouldn’t have to stop before a mission checkpoint to hear the dialogue finish but it happens nearly every time CJ and Ryder start having a conversation across the dashboard, I have to park a few meters away from the mission trigger to hear character development happen, it’s like the game’s narrative is not just fighting the player but the nature of the open world itself. The missions also have some straight up awful mini games like the beat matching games where you have to dance or bounce a low rider to arrows like a really slow and clunky step-mania, quite frankly I would not choose to play these game if a couple weren’t required for progression, I decided to cheat engine myself 100,000 points and browsed my phone whilst they played themselves out, you might call this a ‘skill issue’ I assure you that I am capable of playing bad rhythm games, but I don’t actually want to, I would rather be, you know, stealing cars? Shooting people? Playing a bloody Grand Theft Auto game and not Project Diva Compton.

The game is festooned with half-baked mechanics that often feel like the game is trying to be too ambitious, there are terrible stealth missions where you have to crouch walk everywhere for example and whilst I do appreciate that the developers wanted to introduce new scenarios and new mechanics for players to experience I would much rather they took the approach of letting me create my own experiences. When I was playing Vice City and I found a way to sneak weapons into the golf course to snipe an assassination target at range that was ME creating MY OWN stealth mission, I didn’t need a visibility meter or noise meter or a new suite of mechanics that only work in a certain area, instead I built my own gameplay story and expressed myself without the game’s overbearing hand guiding me through it.

San Andreas is filled with ambitious mechanics that aren’t developed enough, the game has life-sim elements where you can increase your fatness, athleticism, muscle and lung capacity, these all effect the on foot gameplay and they add a really awesome element of flavour, I love that you can eat a ton of chicken buckets from fast food places and CJ will start to make wise cracks about his weight, characters will even call you up and tell you to go to the gym. This system is such a brilliant thing to add to this huge world but it’s fucked up by making the gym sections where you gain stamina and muscle these awful button mashing mini games that are a serious concern for people with RSI, its like the game can’t stop switching out the mechanics before fully exploring them. Another life-sim element that annoys the shit out of me is the mechanic of dating women, this ties into the rags to riches power fantasy as you begin to date sexier and more classy women who expect you to dress better and have a nice car but again it’s not thought out properly, you will be hit with random notifications that your ‘progress with Denise’ has dropped it’s like the game constantly demands attention from you as if it were a real relationship but all that it accomplishes is making the player go and do things that they may not want to do. My relationship with a girl should not decrease like a meter 10 minutes after I had already met with her and completed a series of very obtuse and boring date objectives like going to a bar wearing an appropriate amount of swag clothing and a $300 flat top.

I’m sure I could say more about the fact that you’re expected to cheat on multiple women who are largely portrayed as shallow gold diggers that you fuck for like, power ups and car spawns but its a 2004 GTA game, I wasn’t expecting much.

Another element that falls flat for me is the map layout, on the one hand its much much larger than previous games and the game continues the trend from Vice City of having cool interiors and little details, in terms of a variety in elevation and road complexity it still holds up today but it is much harder to navigate than most open world maps, very often I was met impassible geometry between me and an objective. Verticality is a big part of the San Andreas map but its supremely annoying to navigate because it results in the game putting a brick wall in your face and you need to drive an entire block around it. The areas outside the cities are expansive and devoid of any significant landmarks, Vice City and GTA 3 did a good job of getting players used to their environment by landmarking shops and points of interest with other areas to create a puzzle-like map that players could familiarise themselves with quickly. Highways in Vice City were dotted with interesting coloured buildings or a business or a unique bridge to cross to reach a new part of the city, compare this to San Andreas where you drive along featureless two lane highways between cities as if the game is attempting to recreate the mundane experience of driving in real life California. Areas are so generic that you can’t get used to them and you are forced to check a map to make sure the long, twisting road you’re driving on won’t just shit you out in a completely arbitrary direction. When I think about the West Coast of the US and the places there I don’t think too fondly of driving for hours on the i-15 and yet that's exactly what the San Andreas map feels like. Bad traversal of the map is mitigated somewhat by the new inclusion of really fun on foot options like parachutes and jetpacks but these aren’t always available, the bulk of a GTA game is always driving and having a map that feels boxed in whilst also being way too big is frankly upsetting.

It may sound dramatic to be upset with a game like this but I feel like I’m missing a trick with San Andreas, I feel like there's something not clicking for me here. I like the story, I like the characters, I like the driving model, I love the soundtrack which would’ve been a hard act to follow after Vice City and yet is still full of bangers and I love the new movement mechanics, I love the extensive amount of content and environments the game has, I appreciate that the game is ambitious even if it is too ambitious sometimes and I can see why it remains so popular amongst fans but there’s just something not right with it. I constantly felt like the game was wrestling away control from me and its the same feeling I get from contemporary Rockstar games. San Andreas exists in this weird space where the franchise hasn’t committed to its goal of a narrative experience and still has remnants of player choice and player expression like weapon pickups and collectibles so I get the impression that I’m supposed to be going out of my way to prepare for something when the game will just take all that away from me and give me a set of tools that I have to use. When the game lets go of the scripted linear focus it’s great and some of my favourite missions were the things like the heists with Catalina, the game lets off and tells you to choose a target and you play out a small heist with a dynamic shoot-out and tense getaways, these were exciting and unpredictable and were on par if not better than some of the best missions in Vice City and GTA 3. When the game rewarded me for increasing my lung capacity ahead of a mission that requires strong swimming that felt good, it felt like the game was acknowledging the choices I made. If San Andreas had a consistent mission structure that really let the player loose on the open world to build their own fun I think it would an incredible game, as it stands I can’t love it as much. Going forward Rockstar games would become increasingly railroaded in focus but also they became utterly immense in their popularity and cultural impact, its clear that even if this game didn’t click with me, millions more came to love this style of game, I think to understand San Andreas you have to appreciate a more authored approached to mission based open world games, but for me I will always prefer the freedom and unchained mayhem of GTA 3 and Vice City.