Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories - M

Very well done, but VERY mature content.

Publisher: Rockstar Games Category/Genre: Video Games - Activity Center Platform: PSP Price: $49.99 Online Enabled: No Graphics: High – Often better than PS2 Playability: Easy – Smart control port Reading Level: Light Release Date: 01/16/2006 ESRB Rating: M for Blood and Gore, Strong Sexual Content, Use of Drugs, Intense Sci-Fi Violence, Strong Violence

Common Sense Note

Parents should know that despite being limited to the small screen of a portable system, this Grand Theft Auto installment features all the violence, sex, drugs, obscentities, and criminal behavior of its console cousins. Parents should not confuse the handheld gaming experience of Nintendo's Gameboy or DS systems with that of the Sony PSP. The PSP has the graphics, sound, and display capbilities to create an immersive experience -- and GTA:LCS puts those capabilities to work for a decidedly adult game.

Families who play this game may want to ask why, despite all the negative attention, games like GTA keep getting made? How far will video games go in depicting sexual fetishes, extreme violence, and hateful language? Are there standards that should be enforced, or should game develpoers be able to express their visions in any way they choose? Is playing a game like GTA:LCS on a handheld system different in any way than playing on a console system?

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Common Sense Review

Reviewed By: Aaron Lazenby

When we last heard from the Grand Theft Auto series, the game's developer was caught, en flagrante, hiding secret sex scenes deep in the code of the last entry, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. While the newest installment of the series, GRAND THEFT AUTO: LIBERTY CITY STORIES is unlikely to gain the attention of senators, industry groups, parents, the media and hackers the way the "Hot Coffee" episode did, it still contains its share of outrageous miscreant behavior.

GTA:LCS shifts the storyline away from the faux-L.A. of San Andreas and back to the site that spawned the series: Liberty City. This PSP-exclusive installment follows Tony Cipriani (a face familiar to anyone who played GTA3 or GTA: Vice City) in his return to the mean streets and acention into the inner circles of the Leone crime family. Players guide Tony as he completes missions that endear him to the godfather of the family, prove to his mother he's man enough to be loved, an bloodies the streets in pursuit of money and respect.

Like the last three GTAs, Liberty City Stories is a landmark sandbox video game experience, allowing players to putter at their own pace in an expansive game universe. Every car on the road can be driven, after yanking its driver out of the front seat by the hair of course. Every location in the game universe can be explored. There is a multi-thread storyline with dozens of missions. Players can dress Tony up with all manner of outfits and weapons. It's this flexability and total immersion that's won the series its acclaim, despite the complaints about its graphic content.

But this impressive, expansive game environement is filled with adults-only material. Storylines feautre domestic violence, drug smuggling, contract killings, rigged elections, canibalism, car bombings and police corruption. As with past GTA games, players can brutally kill innocents and police officers with all manner of weapons, including samurai swords, flame throwers, shotguns, and rocket launchers, to name a few.

There is no doubt that GTA:LCS is an impressive feat for the still young PSP. It's too bad that a game of this imagination and production value doesn't exist for the system without the over-the-top explicit content. In the meantime, your kids are better off sticking to a more appropriate sandbox-style title on their console system, like The Incredible Hulk Ultimate Destruction.

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Content		CS	adults	kids
Content
Sexual Content Strippers, prositutes, strange Oedipal subtext, and offscreen oral sex is just a sampling of the sexual content of GTA:LCS
Violence The standard GTA complaints apply: battling gangs means lots of blood will be shed. Plus you can attack innocents and police officers with no reprisal. For a new twist, cannibalism pops up in the storyline now and again.
Language If you can think of a vulgarity, GTA:LCS uses it.
Message
	Social Behavior The more brutal the crime, the more it pays.
	Commercialism Part of the GTA series and released only for the PSP
	Drug/Alcohol/Tobacco Characters take drugs while gangs import and sell drugs.
	Educational Value