Grand Theft Auto games are not what you'd call slow burners. Even though we've only seen 91 seconds of official GTA 6 footage via its recent first trailer, there was no time for dallying as it threw us head-first into its chaotic criminal world from the outset – a brash tactic each and every game has employed for the last 26 years. One of my all-time favorites kicks off with a tutorial mission that tasks you with stealing a squad car from a police compound, picking up a gangland snitch at a train station, driving him across town to an industrial compactor, and crushing the poor bastard alive while still inside the vehicle.
That game is 1999's GTA 2 – for me, the series' most underrated entry; misunderstood at the time and misremembered looking back. Having rediscovered my favorite Simpsons game from 26 years ago earlier this year, another rummage in my parents' attic while digging out Christmas decorations uncovered my original GTA 2 PC disc. To my delight, using the same external disc drive and legacy Direct X '96 combo, I was able to return to Anywhere USA for the first time since last millennium. And it felt like coming home.
Anywhere, USA
Welcome to Grand Theft Advent – a month-long celebration of Rockstar's enduring crime sim series. Be sure to check in on our GTA 6 coverage hub for more every day throughout December.
Some of you will have picked up Grand Theft Auto 2 via Steam or directly from Rockstar in more recent years, but it somehow passed me by. I believe you can still access the game via Steam if you picked it up before it was removed from Valve's digital storefront in 2013, but otherwise there are no official means to play in 2023. That is, unless you stumble upon an OG copy like me, and remember how weird pretty much everything about the top-down open-world crime fest was and still is.
Its live-action intro, filmed at least partially in New York City, is a breakneck, B-movie, straight-to-VHS, cringe/charm offensive that isn't particularly relevant to anything that happens in the actual game. The game itself is dark and moody, and more cyberpunk than pretty much every cyberpunk-styled game I've played since; and its gang reputation system was years ahead of its time. Better still, GTA 2 was gorgeous on PC, sharp and stylized like nothing that'd come before it in this mold, and something that still holds up so well today, almost a quarter of a century later.
I remember being blown away by GTA 2's day and night cycle at the time – a feature exclusive to its PC release – where the glow of street lamps and nightclubs, gang hideouts and traffic lights would reflect pools of light wherever they stood. Open-world games existed in 1999 (not least via the first Grand Theft Auto game two years earlier, and its subsequent DLC in the interim) but GTA 2 was the first game that I can remember making me consider the idea of a living and breathing, reactive and dynamically changing setting.
"I thought that was bullshit at the time aged 13 years old, and I still feel the same way at 37. GTA 2 is a stone-cold classic that paved the way for everything that was yet to come"
Anywhere USA, as it's ambiguously known, is brimming with life and so much death, but it's also home to nasty bastards who'll rob you on the street, who'll steal your car, and who'll chase you down the road if you bang into their vehicle. By completing missions for specific gangs – each playable zone has three active factions – you'll earn respect among their ranks, while directly pissing off another crew. The deeper you go with any gang, the more involved and dangerous your paid-for errands get – and while this is commonplace these days within any open-world crime sim worth its salt, this was all pretty cutting edge at the turn of the millennium.
The gap between the most powerful consoles and PCs is as minute as it's ever been in 2023, but this wasn't the case in 1999. I remember playing GTA 2 on my mate's PS1 at the time and being genuinely shocked by how different the two games looked across platforms – and while this might sound like I'm turning my nose up at the game's console counterpart, I was simply so impressed with how brilliant my game looked on desktop. I'd always downplayed the technological jump, mostly because I'd never really played games on PC to any extent (the Atari ST aside), instead having graduated from the Mega Drive/Genesis to the PS1.
GTA 2 was always considered a good game but not a great one, one that gave the original Grand Theft Auto formula a Pay 'n' Spray and a fresh lick of paint, but didn't really push the genre forward enough. I thought that was bullshit at the time aged 13 years old, and I still feel the same way at 37. GTA 2 is a stone-cold classic that paved the way for everything that was yet to come.
And so now I'm speeding round dimly-lit corners in a blacked-out mini van, armed to the teeth and riding alongside a team of Zaibatsu gang members. We're on our way to massacre a squad of rival Loonies, after which we'll steal their cars, arm them with explosives and blow their hideout to smithereens. Grand Theft Auto games are not what you'd call slow burners. GTA 2 never was, and now that I've reintroduced it into my life, it never will be.
How many of the best games like GTA have you played?
