CJ comes back to Grove Street and gets caught up in plenty of things in the best Grand Theft Auto game of all time!
It starts with Carl "CJ" Johnson coming back to Los Santos after hearing about the death of his mother. He had lived in Liberty City for the past five years. Grove Street has faded and is not well known around the city. After CJ learns about one of his long time friends Big Smoke working with the Ballas, Sweet gets set up which causes a gunfight which then gets him arrested. CJ gets stranded out in the country, and from there on he does everything he can to free his brother and get Grove Street back on the map and take down Big Smoke. Plenty of characters in this game, all with a great personality and superb writing, along with it being arguably one of the funniest games out there, if not, it is the funniest.
Oh man, the gameplay and mission structure is perfect. San Andreas has your series roots gameplay, with driving, shooting, etc. On SA you have skill metres, which can determine how good you are with a weapon, how good you are at biking, driving, running, how much muscle / fat you have, how much respect you have, etc. The game can be definitely hard for some, but if you get some practice and always have armor and enough ammo for good guns, you're definitely gonna find this game a walk in the park with still some challenge. You can get involved in gang wars, which is awesome. Some of the missions can be very challenging while some are very easy, and you get tons of variety throughout the whole game. One mission you drive a forklift and put crates into the back of a truck, another you invade a house and have to sneak around, another you sneak into a mansion and steal a rappers rhyme book, you learn how to fly a plane and then have several missions based around flying, and the list goes on. Tons of variety, and it's so much fun. The only complaint with the gameplay is the FLYING SCHOOL. Once you get used to flying it's easy although still hard to make some of those turns, this school makes you have extremely high amounts of precision, and this mission is required to beat the game, so have fun with it. Other than that, the gameplay is perfect.
Although not the best looking game on the Xbox, it sure as hell does look great even to this day. I had it hooked up to my 47" HD TV and it still looked amazing on it, which is pretty surprising for how old it is. It has the same graphics as GTA III and Vice City, but that's not a bad thing, although SA has a lot more in it which probably makes it look better such as the country side and all of the different things in the city. Still looks fantastic, no complaints.
If there's anything that would make me give the soundtrack a perfect rating, it's the main theme. That theme is so good I have it set to my ringtone on my phone, and I listen to it daily and it never gets old. You still get a bunch of different stations and songs while driving a car, which also adds to it. Great soundtrack, and I honestly have to say it's flawless.
Oh, you wanna know how long this game is? The storyline is about 20-30 hours depending on if you do a lot more to get money or explore or take up the side missions, but it also depends on if you load your save closest to the mission you just failed, or if you make your way back to the mission and restart it. But doing everything must take at least 80+ hours which is enough to win me over.
I honestly think this is a game that I can play everyday. I know I use the term "I could play this game any day", but this and only a few other games deserve me to actually play them everyday which means it must be pretty good. It just keeps you coming back for more... There's really no describing it, it's just addictive.
Overall, this is the best Grand Theft Auto game there is and ever will me, and I honestly give it the award of my third favourite game of all time which is a mighty big thing to say. It never gets old or boring, and it provides a lot of variety and challenge which makes it worth playing for anyone who is interested in these types of games or that would understand it to it's full extent. Definitely a game that I could recommend to any of my friends. If you don't have this game, buy it, now, it'll make you the happiest person alive.
Pros:
+Great writing and very well voice acting and cast of characters
+Superb gameplay that adds tons of variety and challenge
+One of the best main themes in any video game ever
+An extremely large amount of things to do
+Very easy to pick up and play any day
Cons:
-Flying School
Story: 10/10
Gameplay: 10/10
Graphics: 9.8/10
Soundtrack: 10/10
Lifetime: 10/10
Replay Value: 10/10
Overall: 10/10