GTA3-style design - How did it evolve?

I was playing some Mercenaries today and thinking how cool it is that we have games like this nowadways, i.e. large, free-roaming, open-ended, 3d action games where you can go on foot or enter various vehicles. Grand Theft Auto III was obviously the catalyst for this but I find it interesting to look back at the steps that brought us to 3d GTA-style games.



1976

I figured I would start here with Exidy's arcade game Death Race. Best known for being the first controversial video game, it was likely the first driving game where the object was to run over enemies instead of racing them.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/.../deathrace.jpg


1984

I have been trying to think of the first game to allow you to enter and exit a vehicle in-game. Synapse Software's Atari 8-bit/C64 game N.Y.C. - The Big Apple/New York City is the oldest I can think of. Although graphically crude and not much fun to play, this game was ahead of its time in that way. It let you explore the city how you wanted, different locations had different mini-games, and if you got hurt it cost you money to use the hospital.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/.../nyc%20c64.gif


1985

NYC may have sucked but A. Eddy Goldfarb & Associates' Hot Wheels for the C64 was a neat "sandbox" game at the time. While it didn't have any of the violence of GTA, nor could you go on foot anywhere you wanted, it still had a various areas to explore, you could change your car's paint job, play demolition derby, use a fire engine to put out fires, etc..
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...t%20wheels.gif


1991

1991 was hugely significant for this type of design for at least two games.

Paul Holmes' Amiga/ST game Hunter was a groundbreaking title. It had nearly everything we associate with these modern vehicular games: it was polygonal 3d and it let you approach missions in various ways by being able to enter various vehicles you find. The game has aged but it was very impressive at the time.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/.../hunter_03.gif

Bethesda's The Terminator for PC was the first of several games they made with this license. The game uses a first-person view. You can go on foot or steal vehicles to use. You have the option to steal in weapons shops and banks as well. Having the cops attacking you for committing crimes is another GTA-like quality. I don't recall it having as much wandering as in Hunter but both games are certainly very notable for this topic.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...rminatorPC.gif


1994

Imagexcel's Quarantine (PC, 3DO, Playstation) is another predecessor to games like GTA3. You can't exit your vehicle but its free-roaming nature of driving/shooting around town (and running over pedestrians) gives it some similarities. Quarantine had a sequel the following year. I didn't play it as much but I think it added more variety with racing missions and stuff.

So Quarantine could also be seen as a predecessor to games like Crazy Taxi and the 3d vehicular combat genre which took on new life in 1995 with Twisted Metal. I don't know how Quarantine has aged but I loved it back then.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...Quarantine.png


1997

It's only natural to mention the original Grand Theft Auto in this thread. Other than being confined to a 2d overhead view, this was in concept like GTA3. 3d made the series 100x better, IMO, but I still have to respect this.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...eater/gta1.gif

The controversial, violent 3d racing game Carmageddon came out around the same time as did Activision's 3d mission-based driving action game Interstate '76.


1998

DMA Design took a big step towards GTA3's style with their N64 game Body Harvest. The way you can enter vehicles and play missions is very similar in feel. The biggest difference is the sci-fi theme.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...%20harvest.jpg


1999

Developer Reflections was no stranger to 3d vehicle games like early 32-bit games like Wipeout and Destruction Derby. 1999's Playstation/PC game Driver: You are the Wheelman was another game heading towards modern vehicle action games with its city to explore.


2000

Driver 2: The Wheelman is Back brought us even closer by letting the player exit his vehicle to steal another one.
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/hosted/...driver%202.jpg

GTA3 took things to a new level with its scope and feel. It blew me away like few games have. Still, it didn't arise out of thin air as the above games demonstrate.


So, those are important games that came to mind for me. I'm sure there are more so let's add them and discuss the evolution of this type of design.

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Paul Holmes' Amiga/ST game Hunter was a groundbreaking title. It had nearly everything we associate with these modern vehicular games: it was polygonal 3d and it let you approach missions in various ways by being able to enter various vehicles you find. The game has aged but it was very impressive at the time.

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I can't really say why this game looks so neat to me, but it does. I think I really like the look of early 3D games, for whatever reason.

Wouldn't Postal fit in here somewhere?

Also, did you ever do one of these based of first person dungeon RPGs?

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Originally Posted by Tain

I can't really say why this game looks so neat to me, but it does. I think I really like the look of early 3D games, for whatever reason.

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I agree. There's something charming about seeing a game that appears plain on the surface have so much to offer underneath it.

How about Mercenary and Damocles? Both were huge open worlds with open-ended puzzle solving.

What would really interest me is how many of these open-ended style predecessors were designed by Western devs? GTAIII seems like a perfect culmination/example of Western ideologies in game design.

Awesome thread neo.

I've never played GTA 3 or any of the games it inspired. It's worth a look, I take it?

...You could say that they're respected games, yeah.

There really isn't a consensus as to which of the three games in the GTA3 trilogy is the best, but I say San Andreas. Followed by 3, then Vice.

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Originally Posted by Tain

...You could say that they're respected games, yeah.

There really isn't a consensus as to which of the three games in the GTA3 trilogy is the best, but I say San Andreas. Followed by 3, then Vice.

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I'd actually put Liberty City Stories above Vice City. Sure, it's a retread, but the added traffic density made going nuts on the mayhem a ton of fun. I just wish it had had some kind of flight.

I need to play Body Harvest one of these days.

James

Vice City is my favourite of the GTA3 "trilogy plus two".

Urban Chaos for the PS1/DC should be included on that list. I played it after the GTA3 and I was surprised at some of the similarities.

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Originally Posted by Tain

I can't really say why this game looks so neat to me, but it does. I think I really like the look of early 3D games, for whatever reason.

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The same thing occurred to me yesterday while reading a review of an old freescape game.

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Originally Posted by Survival Kid

Wouldn't Postal fit in here somewhere?

Also, did you ever do one of these based of first person dungeon RPGs?

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Postal? Maybe. I don't remember the first Postal that well. I don't recall vehicle usage anyway.

I did a thread on Western RPGs a long time ago which included those kind.

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Originally Posted by arjue

Awesome thread neo.

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Thanks. :)

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Originally Posted by bVork

How about Mercenary and Damocles? Both were huge open worlds with open-ended puzzle solving.

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Yeah, they're worth mentioning although they don't remind me of GTA as much as Hunter from what I remember.

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Originally Posted by soundwave

Urban Chaos for the PS1/DC should be included on that list.

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I played the PC demo and thought it sucked. I figured it was a simple action game.

As for the GTA recommendations, I haven't played the PSP games or ports, but San Andreas has the most to it. It might be overwhelming to play it first though as it's so big.

Maybe it doesn't fit in so well, but there was a PC racing game called Vette. You had to get from one end of a city to the other, but you could take any path through it you wanted, or just fuck off and go drive around the city. There was no out of car play though.

Didn't Rockstar North (GTA3) make Body Harvest?

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Originally Posted by Dolemite

Didn't Rockstar North (GTA3) make Body Harvest?

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Yes, but they used to be called DMA Design until they were bought out and put under the Rockstar Games label.

DMA Design, yeah, that's it. I knew they used to be called DMA something.

Quarantine was a classic. Was it ever ported to a home console (I vaguely remember hearing about a Saturn port)?

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Originally Posted by SpoDaddy

Quarantine was a classic. Was it ever ported to a home console (I vaguely remember hearing about a Saturn port)?

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Originally Posted by Zeed

Imagexcel's Quarantine (PC, 3DO, Playstation)

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;)

I meant to check if the PS1 did actually come out before posting. Supposedly it was a Japanese release called Hard Rock Cab but I'm not certain if it was released.

I don't recall Quarantine being released in the US for the Playstation.

I bought and attempted to play through Body Harvest three or four years ago, and even back then it was slow-paced and boring as hell. I lost all interest after beating the first boss and haven't bothered to pick it up since.

Also, this is going off an ancient memory of a game that I only played once for about three-four hours, but wasn't the NES version of Dick Tracy somewhat of a precursor to the 2D GTA games? I remember that you would drive around a huge city in your police car chasing criminals as the police station called in your missions through the car radio. Additionally, I think you could get out of the car to explore the city and enter warehouses where you would shoot and capture criminals in sidescrolling segments. Anyone else play that one?

Oh yeah, good call on NES Dick Tracy. You could exit your car and walk around in that game. I was trying to think of NES games but all I could think of was Mad Max which doesn't quite fit.

How about Motor City Patrol for the NES? You can't get out of the car, but you drive around the city (as a cop) trying to catch the robbers. The game isn't all that great though....

Would you consider Midwinter an early sandbox game?

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Originally Posted by NeoZeedeater

Postal? Maybe. I don't remember the first Postal that well. I don't recall vehicle usage anyway.

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I'm pretty sure Postal had sandbox elements to it. On top of that, you ran around the city killing innocent civilians, much like everyone's favorite GTA pastime. I've heard the idea for the original GTA partially came from Postal, though that could be wrong.

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Originally Posted by g0zen

Would you consider Midwinter an early sandbox game?

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I do consider the Midwinter series sandbox games but I decided they were too strategy-like for the topic. I can see them being included, though. They were 3d and had various vehicles.

That NES Dick Tracy game was the shit when it first came out - I was disappointed that the Genesis game wasn't basically a copy of it just with better graphics since I loved it so much but felt the concept should've been done on stronger hardware.

Great concept for a thread. I was quite oblivious to most of the games you mentioned before Quarantine.