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Dom Robinson reviews
Rockstar Games
- Price: £29.99
- Players: 1
- System Requirements (recom):
- Windows 98/2000/ME/XP
- Intel Pentium II 450Mhz (700Mhz)
- 96Mb RAM (128Mb)
- 4-speed CD-ROM (8-speed)
- 16Mb DirectX 8.1-compatible graphics card (32Mb)
- 700Mb Hard Disk Space
- DirectX 8.1
Grand Theft Auto 3 was a wonderful game on the PS2, but you can read all my observations about it in that review, as they’re exactly the same here.
Sadly, the same cannot be said with this release.
Could I get the PC release to work properly? No, because it’s one of the most buggy pieces of software I’ve come across.
First of all, it wouldn’t work at all with my previous graphics card, a 3Dfx Voodoo 3 3000 AGP. Ok, so I agree that that card was a bit on the old side, even if I’d only had it for two years, but it wasn’t exactly compliant with games that use DirectX 8.1 drivers. So, I invested in an ATI Radeon 8500LE 64Mb card (aka 3d Prophet 8500LE 64Mb) which has worked fine for other games that didn’t get along with my previous card…
But, it really does not like my Radeon, nor many other kinds of cards as it turns out. The problem? It’s glitchy, it’s sticky, and even if you can get past all that, then when it gets dark or gets to around midday, all of a sudden the textured surfaces just disappear and it’s like walking round in an intense mist, aside from a couple of bold colours like red blood. This problem doesn’t go away and you have to quit out. Try the game again and you don’t get too far before it kicks in again. Didn’t Rockstar have a quality control dept for this PC port? I even tried patch 1.1 but to no avail.
Overall, this version is completely unplayable once the problems begin and I can’t think what the developers were thinking. Buy the PS2 version instead, the graphics for which still aren’t perfect – and we were promised fantastic results with this conversion that didn’t come true – but at least you can bloody play the thing! A review of which can be found HERE. Just a shame the PS2 got the console-exclusive for the series until 2004 as it would’ve looked even better on the Xbox.
SOUND EFFECTS AND MUSIC
PLAYABILITY
ENJOYMENT
OVERALL 
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.