Grand Theft Auto V

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Recently the big news in the video game world has been the release of a new trailer by Rockstar Games. One of the most anticipated games of all time, Grand Theft Auto IV by Rockstar Games, had its first trailer released. Not only is Grand Theft Auto IV going to be huge because of its huge popularity but it will be the first Grand Theft Auto game on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. We still have a few months before Grand Theft Auto IV is released though so in the meantime let’s take a look at the history of company that makes the Grand Theft Auto series, Rockstar Games.

Rockstar Games was originally called DMA. DMA didn’t really stand for anything, the initials were used simply because “it sounded cool”. At one point DMA was said to mean Direct Mind Access but the developers of DMA jokingly always told people DMA stood for “Doesn’t Mean Anything.”

DMA first saw success after signing with UK Label Psygnosis and releasing two games called Menace and Blood Money. Blood Money and Menace were side-scrolling space shooters that were praised for their difficulty level and great presentation. Both games were originally published for Amiga but later came to the Commodore 64, DOS and Atari ST.

Long before Rockstar Games released the Grand Theft Auto series DMA had their first huge hit with another well known game, Lemmings. In the Lemmings video game the player controlled 100 small creatures that weren’t very bright and often walked off ledged or into pits. It was up to the player to help the lemmings cross to the other side of the screen by building bridges and other things. Lemmings sold 20 million copies on 21 different systems. The next few years DMA focused largely on Lemmings sequels although they also released two more original titles, Walker and Hired Guns.

DMA’s first game without Psygnosis came in 1994 when they released Uniracers. Uniracers was published by Nintendo and debuted on the Super Nintendo. Uniracers was a racing game that featured riderless unicycles that did stunts.

Nintendo then asked DMA to join their Dream Team along with other developers such as Rare, Paradigm, Midway and LucasArts. That meant that DMA would produce a title that was exclusive to Nintendo’s new system, the Nintendo 64. DMA’s Nintendo 64 exclusive was a game called Body Harvest. Body Harvest was a game about aliens arriving on Earth to harvest humans for food. Body Harvest was a third person 3D vehicular game but Nintendo insisted that DMA overhaul the game and implement puzzle and role-playing elements. The game was delayed several times because of the changes and Nintendo eventually dropped their plans to publish it. Midway picked up the rights and released Body Harvest in 1998. Body Harvest got some pretty positive reaction, mostly for it’s free-roaming gameplay, something that would be a huge part of the success of Rockstar Games and their Grand Theft Auto series.

The first Grand Theft Auto game actually came before Rockstar Games when DMA released the first game in the series for the PC and the first Playstation. Unlike the later versions of Grand Theft Auto, the first game in the series was a top-down 2D game. In Grand Theft Auto the player had the ability to operate any vehicle in the entire environment, another feature that Rockstar Games would adopt from the Body Harvest game. In Grand Theft Auto the player controls a hood who works his way up the criminal ranks in three fictional cities: Liberty City, Vice City and San Andreas. Grand Theft Auto got criticized for its violence even at this early time but the uproar wasn’t quite as large since the original Grand Theft Auto wasn’t as popular as the others. Grand Theft Auto was extremely well liked because the cities were fully explorable with tons of freedom and a lot of optional missions.

DMA’s second title for the N64 was a 3D platform called Space Station Silicon Valley, that took featured robotic animals. Like in Body Harvest and Grand Theft Auto, Space Station Silicon Valley had an environment where you could get into any vehicle except instead of cars and trucks your vehicles were robotic animals that each has its own unique abilities.

In 1997 DMA was bought by Gremlin Interactive but in 1999 Gremlin was acquired by Infrogrames. BMG Interactive, the publishers of the first Grand Theft Auto game, then acquired DMA and it became Rockstar North, a branch of Rockstar Games and an internal label of publisher Take Two.

The second Grand Theft Auto game by Rockstar Games was another top-down version like the first but in 2001 the Grand Theft Auto series and Rockstar Games took a big step forward with Grand Theft Auto III. Grand Theft Auto II was the first game in the series that was fully in 3D. Grand Theft Auto III was Playstation 2’s biggest system seller in the United States and Europe so Sony paid Rockstar Games to keep it exclusive to the Playstation 2. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City was then released by Rockstar Games on Playstation 2 and was even bigger and better.

In 2003 Rockstar Games released Manhunt, a violent stealth game in which an executed death-row inmate becomes the star of a new snuff film. Rockstar Games then followed with Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas in 2004. The Grand Theft Auto games continued to gain more and more popularity for Rockstar Games as well as criticism due to its extreme violence.

Now Rockstar Games is working on the aforementioned Grand Theft Auto IV. As great as the Grand Theft Auto series has been already there is no telling how much better Rockstar Games could make it on the new generation of video game systems. Rockstar Games is also no longer a Playstation exclusive publisher so you will be able to play Grand Theft Auto IV on both Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.

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