GTA: San Andreas

The sixth installment of the GTA series: San Andreas opens up the boundaries of Grand Theft Auto with more weapons, more cars and a lifesize map.

Set in the early 1990s. San Andreas is a city troubled by gangs, drugs and corruption. You are hurled back into the city as the character of "CJ" who finds that the friends and family he left behind years ago are far from the people they used to be. This is no vice city. The characters are darker, the story is full of corruption and you often find yourself feeling sorry for the poor bastard.

As a massive GTA fan, I was very sceptical at first about this game. It was very different to play this, it misses the dark humour that exists in all previous GTA games. However the possibilites of the city are endless. Sometimes the skill levels and "respect" bars get a bit annoying, I mean playing a game to raise skill is almost stepping on MMORPG terratory.

Eventually this game shone through though and is now my favourite GTA game. I still play it at least 10 hours a week, finding goodies, carjacking, shooting up the hood and generally laughing like a maniac whilst doing it. The physics of this game are relativly impressive, including articulating objects (Tankers, towtucks and tractors), "movie style" splash and realistic aircraft handling.

On the PC this game has serveral advantages over fellow PS2 users. Using the right combination of patches and mods - you can change any car you want into any car you want. So you could fill your city up with Ferraris if you wanted to. You can also customise every aspect of the game, adding new objects, tuning your vehicles to do whatever speed you want them to or putting in new buildings (as well as removing them).

This is also the magical mod of MTA (Multi theft auto). This allows you to do races or deathmatch with other users over the internet. This only runs over the top of San Andreas though, so if you fancy playing with yourself (no inuendo intended) then you can go right back to the city alone.