In my opinion, still the very best GTA game of them all. Although the Vice City and San Andreas follow-ups have a lot of upgraded gameplay features that GTAIII would have benefited from, GTAIII is the one that made the most of what it had. The missions felt right, and although the final mission was bastard tough to complete, they seemed to progress with the right balance of frustration and fun. Plus, the tighter police presence in Liberty City always made the challenge fresh. Above all, Vice City and San Andreas merely extend upon GTAIII, so by the time you stir up the crime rate in Las Venturas in the state of San Andreas, you basically start to feel that you're not doing terribly much that's different to Liberty City's offerings. Sure, you get to fly a mig jet, but it doesn't seem integral to the gameplay and just a nice curiosity for 2 of the missions. GTAIII is the best because, although its graphics may look decidedly old, and its gameplay lacks for some of the more modern innovations, it's the game in the franchise that sucked me in the most, and gave me the fondest memories of just about any game I've played in the last 10 years.