The very original Grand Theft Auto is somewhat of a frenetic mess that was somehow really damn impactful and controversial enough to make one of the highest-grossing video game franchises of all time, and it's funny considering how the game is as rough and outdated as it is and yet somehow retains the raunchy, comedic charm that would forge the series identity from here until forever.

Grand Theft Auto is a 1997 crime simulator with a sort of open world, and playing it nowadays feels prehistoric as it feels outdated in every regard, but mostly in the way that it is played being a top-down game with a nauseating camera panning everywhere, with missions being often times pretty hard to pull off first try, and the fact that you have to rack up points to move on with no mission retries, limited lives and practically no forgiveness as you lose yourself in the urban jungle that is Liberty City and later on San Andreas and Vice City, too. Don't get me wrong, it sucks, but it really feels like an experience to be had since every single landmark of the franchise is there somehow. The parody nature of the characters being super edgy and cursing you out for everything, the US states and cities that have been changed ever so slightly making up the Liberty City, San Andreas and Vice City we know now, and just the frantic nature of running over pedestrians and blowing up stuff is proper of the franchise, so even if the story is pretty much nonexistent and it was planned out to be like an arcade game over everything, it's crazy to see how much it would grow from this.

Also, pretty uncontested point but the soundtrack is so damn good for no reason at all, they really had an entire radio goin' on before actual good controls lmao