It’s hard to believe that in three short years, Rockstar Games popularized and perfected the open-world video game. In 2001, Grand Theft Auto III successfully translated the top-down chaos of the original two crime games into 3D for the first time, creating a cultural phenomenon in the process. The following year, the developers added glitzy pizzazz and 80’s nostalgia to an already winning formula with Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.
To complete the hat-trick, Rockstar Games could’ve hit an easy lay-up. Some minor improvements and a gimmicky new feature would’ve sufficed and sold millions. Instead, Rockstar went up to bat and hit a grand slam. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, released 20 years ago today, took what its two predecessors did so well and expanded on it in ways no one saw coming. It’s a sequel so jam-packed with new features, crazy one-off ideas, and memorable moments, it remains a touchstone in video game history a generation later. San Andreas is the sequel of gamers’ wildest dreams and one of the most influential games in the open-world genre.
San Andreas is already a pretty outside-the-box idea. After two games lampooning mob movies and the Italian stereotypes within, Rockstar’s third game ran in the other direction. This was a game set in a fictionalized version of California and Nevada during the early 90s. In the starring role was Carl “CJ” Johnson, a native of the state returning home after his mom’s passing. Instead of cribbing from Goodfellas and Scorsese, San Andreas borrowed from classic 90s hood films like South Central and Boyz n the Hood.
A game starring a Black protagonist was pretty rare in 2004, let alone one paying homage to hallmark films in the history of Black cinema. Yet here was one of the biggest games of that year centering the Black experience (granted, a very cartoonish depiction of it) in its story. Johnson’s return to the gang lifestyle that pushed him away from his hometown sets him on an adventure spanning the entire state doing ludicrous mission after another. Unlike Tommy Vercetti and Claude Speed before him, CJ manages to be charming, endearing, and many times hilarious. His likability is the reason he remains an internet meme to this day.
The only character as memorable as CJ is his home state. Unlike the last two games which took place in a single city, San Andreas upped the sense of scale immensely. The game featured three cities: Los Santos (an approximation of Los Angeles), San Fierro (based on San Francisco), and Las Venturas (based on Las Vegas). And while each of these fictional cities felt as large as all of GTA III’s Liberty City on their own, the state of San Andreas also included miles of forest area, rural counties and farmland, deserts, and even mountains filling out the spaces in between. At the time, no console game felt as large and as alive as San Andreas. And every view of this sprawling metropolis is a sight to behold.
That sense of scale didn’t just come from the sheer size of San Andreas, but all that was possible within. Playing San Andreas often feels like Rockstar Games said yes to every idea its developers pitched. In just the first few hours, players can go out clubbing, ride bikes at a skate park, play basketball, date, perform home invasions, work out (or don’t and gain weight, both options offer advantages and disadvantages), play pool, spray paint streets or play in-game video game consoles and arcade machines. And this is all before one leaves the first city.
It’s absurd how much there is to do in San Andreas. None of it is treated like a required checklist like some of today’s open-world games either. It’s all there to help create a real sense of place and player agency. The protagonist CJ can be molded however the player sees fit. Learn kickboxing, go to pilot school, use weapons to increase his athleticism and respectability in city streets.
Exploration is also rewarded. Want to sneak into an army base in the desert? Pull it off and you’ll find a military fighter jet or a jetpack. Want to gamble? Roll up to one of the many casinos on the Las Venturas strip and risk going into debt. Think you can make it to the top of the state’s tallest mountain? Doing so will net you a parachute for a thrilling skydive back to the forest down below.
The sheer variety of San Andreas often feels like it has more in common with a modern Yakuza game than either of its previous games in the series. There were tons of Grand Theft Auto copycats before San Andreas: True Crime: Streets Of LA to Driver 3. But while many of them were fun to play, all of them were dwarfed by the ambition of San Andreas. Competitors that followed Rockstar’s magnum opus, like 2006’s Saints Row, struggled to match the feeling. Even 2008’s Grand Theft Auto IV was remarkably smaller (by design) than San Andreas, as Rockstar chose to increase city density over creating a massive world.
For years, San Andreas was the standard for how to do open-world games correctly. While more modern games like From Software’s Elden Ring and Nintendo’s Tears Of The Kingdom have since surpassed it in scale and cool moments of discovery, San Andreas was the first game that felt truly infinite in this way. San Andreas was less about screwing around and making your own fun, and instead exploring every inch of the worth for the next cool secret or weird one-off mechanic.
San Andreas’ success speaks for itself. It is the best-selling video game on the PlayStation 2, the best-selling console of all time. It earned countless Game of the Year awards and remains one of the highest-rated games ever made.
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is a perfect sequel in just about every way possible. It somehow defied expectations for what a follow-up to GTA III and GTA: Vice City could be and set the bar for what its developer continues to strive for to this day. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is the high point of gaming’s most important and most controversial franchise, and its impact continues to be felt in the industry today.
