Grand Theft Auto (Video Game)

Grand Theft Auto is an action-adventure video game developed by DMA Design and published by BMG Interactive. It is the first title of the Grand Theft Auto series and was released in November 1997 for MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows, in December 1997 for the PlayStation and in October 1999 for the Game Boy Color. The game's narrative follows a criminal who climbs in status within the criminal underworld across three fictional cities, inspired by real-life locations.

Gameplay
Grand Theft Auto is made up of six levels split between three main cities; each locale is based on a real-life city in the United States, with an alternative name: Liberty City (New York City), San Andreas (San Francisco), and Vice City (Miami). The progression is linear, as each level completed automatically unlocks the next one in the chain.

Players begin a game choosing a character from amongst eight—four in the PlayStation version—and naming them, though the choice is purely aesthetic, and doesn't affect the overall gameplay. In each level, the player's ultimate objective is to reach a target number of points, which starts at $1,000,000 but becomes higher in the later levels, and then reach the level's "goal" to complete the stage.

Development
The development of Grand Theft Auto began on 4 April 1995 at DMA Design in Dundee. It originally had a protracted four-year development, which included a title change and numerous attempts to halt development. It was originally planned to be released on MS-DOS, Windows 95, PlayStation, Sega Saturn and the Nintendo 64. However, it was never released for the two latter consoles. During the development of Grand Theft Auto, many people overseeing the game's progress attempted to halt the development, which led the crew at DMA Design to have to convince them to allow them to continue.

Soundtrack
The freedom of the game's world led the DMA team to believe that gamers would like to listen to different music while driving around the city, and so came up with the idea of several radio stations that would play music from various genres. Grand Theft Auto features seven radio stations and a police band track. All can be heard when the player enters a vehicle; however, each vehicle only receives a limited number of stations.

Reception
The game was a best-seller in the UK. By November 1998, global shipments to retailers of Grand Theft Auto's computer and PlayStation versions had surpassed 1 million units combined. At the 1999 Milia festival in Cannes, it took home a "Gold" prize for revenues above €17 million in the European Union during 1998. The game was a commercial success, though it received mixed reviews upon release.