The Grand Theft Auto games are famed for their sprawling recreations of famous US cities: Liberty City is New York City, Vice City is Miami, Los Santos is Los Angeles. And despite being around for nearly 30 years now, the series has—with one exception, noted further below—never ventured outside of American borders. In a recent interview with Lex Fridman, Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser said there's a good reason for that: Other countries may have great cities, but they're not American cities.
"There's a reason why GTA kept coming back to Miami, New York, Los Angeles," Houser said, agreeing with Fridman's assessment that Miami's blend of "glossy surface and a dark underworld" make it an ideal target for satirizing American culture. "You could move it to any of those and it would work."
