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The Grand Theft Auto IV rendition of Liberty City features a more striking resemblance to New York City.

Liberty City is a fictional city in Rockstar Games' video games series Grand Theft Auto, based primarily on New York City. Three different incarnations of the city have appeared in various generations of the series.

The Grand Theft Auto rendition is portrayed as a city geographically similar to New York City, composed of two mainland islands. The Grand Theft Auto III rendition (also featured in Grand Theft Auto (GBA version), Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories, and briefly in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas) is portrayed as a more generic metropolitan city that is loosely based on New York City, but consists of elements of other American cities. The Grand Theft Auto IV rendition is portrayed as a caricature of New York City, with Liberty City's landmarks and geography based heavily on New York City's. Liberty City's four boroughs, as well as the adjacent state of Alderney correspond to four of New York City's five boroughs and New Jersey, respectively.

In every rendition of the city, Liberty City is primarily depicted as a large city with a sizable population (4 million in the Grand Theft Auto III rendition, with double the amount in Grand Theft Auto IV), featuring a complete transportation infrastructure of roads and railways, and is located on a geographical configuration of shorelines and islands, similar to that of New York City. The city has been described as one suffering from crime and corruption, with the presence of organized crime, feuding street gangs, petty criminals, and rampant misconduct among city officials and law enforcement. Parts of Liberty City have also suffered major damage and loss from bombings, which are depicted as being orchestrated by local criminals. Some of these damages, however, have been repaired or resulted in complete redevelopment of an entire area.

Liberty City is also located in the same fictional universe as Vice City, Carcer City, and San Andreas, other locations portrayed in games throughout the series. Liberty City is the most used fictional setting in the series: it is prominently featured in six of the ten stand-alone Grand Theft Auto games, with a cameo appearance in a further two.

Renditions

The map of Liberty City, as depicted in Grand Theft Auto.

Liberty City has featured in five of the eleven Grand Theft Auto games. In each rendition, it is depicted as a parody of New York City, with recognisable landmarks and features.

Grand Theft Auto

Liberty City was first featured in the original Grand Theft Auto. The city's geography and alignment of districts was more true to that of New York City, featuring two major mainlands with a Manhattan-like central island (which contains a large park at the center, a reference to Central Park), and several smaller islands along a river of the city, with the mainlands and islands connected primarily by road bridges. Train services with lines running in the city were also present. Different neighborhoods of New York City and New Jersey were also spoofed, with naming similar to their real-life counterparts.

Grand Theft Auto III

In 2001 Liberty City became the setting for Grand Theft Auto III, assuming a significantly different design from its original version. The location, circa late-autumn 2001, is ridden with crime and corruption, gang wars, theft, and murder are endemic to everyday life to the point where police intervention has become nearly negligible. It is often referred to as "the worst place in America" by in-game literature. This rendition Liberty City consists of three main islands; Portland Island, Staunton Island and Shoreside Vale. Each are unlocked as the player progresses through the game.

The map of Liberty City, as depicted in Grand Theft Auto III. Right to left: Portland Island, Staunton Island and Shoreside Vale.

Little is known about Liberty City's early history, although dialog exists in GTA III claiming that the city was "a church, a cow pasture and three houses when the telephone was invented", and a map of the city provided in the packaging of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories claims that the city is celebrating its 200th anniversary in 1998, suggesting that the city was founded in 1798. The population of the city is given at four million, as stated in the game's manual. The GTA III website mentions that the city is twinned with Beirut.

The city is divided into three islands, or "boroughs", which in turn are separated into districts and neighborhoods. While the boroughs are different from one another, each borough houses one hospital, one police station and one fire station, with the former two serving as local respawn points in an event the player dies or is arrested, respectively. Portland Island is where the player starts out in the game. It is an island at the eastern end of the city limits, known as a primarily industrial portion of the city. This is a very poor district filled with industrial workers, that is based on the New York City Boroughs of Brooklyn and The Bronx. Staunton Island is depicted as Liberty City's upscale central business district or city center (similar to New York City's Manhattan Island), housing a Times Square-style street, an Empire State Building look-alike (the second tallest building in the city) that dominates the district, and the Love Media building, the workplace and home of Donald Love. The final island, Shoreside Vale, is a hilly and more suburban area of the city, located on the west-most side of Liberty City, and contains the city's airport, Francis International (featuring a structure based on the Los Angeles International's Theme Building).

Liberty City is connected via a series of bridges and tunnels. Some of these are blocked off at various points during the game, which act as a way of restricting access to the whole city until the player has completed certain missions. Liberty City has one major road tunnel system, dubbed Porter Tunnel that connects all boroughs in Liberty City. In addition to road transportation, Liberty City has two subway and elevated train systems that run within the city, bearing similarities to the New York City Subway. The inter-borough subway, an underground subway system connects all three boroughs of the city. The trains run 24 hours a day and the player can access them without using any in-game money.

Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories

Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories takes places in the same Liberty City depicted in Grand Theft Auto III, but is set in 1998, three years before the events in GTA III. As such, the Liberty City Stories rendition of the city explains some of the city's characteristics in GTA III.

Motorcycles are initially permitted in Liberty City. By GTA III, a citywide ban on the vehicle is imposed, explaining the absence of motorcycles in the game. The Maibatsu Corporation of America, is a staunch supporter for increased car use in Liberty City, is seen as a notable advocate and contributor to the ban, funding an organization dubbed "American Road Safety for Everyone" (ARSE) that has lobbied for the ban after "the successful banning of bicycles."

Police cars in Liberty City Stories are depicted assuming a marking and paint scheme that resembles those of the NYPD during the 1990s, although the game's version uses a black-and-white color scheme, instead of blue and white. This design was originally planned to be used for GTA III, but was redesigned into a common panda-like black and white color scheme around the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York City.

One of the biggest differences in the map is the Callahan Bridge is depicted as under construction in Liberty City Stories whereas it was completely usable in GTA III. The alternative method of crossing the river is a ferry service which is unaccessable at times due to protest and industrial action by Liberty City transit workers. This ferry service is no longer present by the time GTA III takes place. Another of the larger changes is that on the site of Fort Staunton exists various businesses and buildings. This area is destroyed as part of the game. As well as these alterations, there are many minor changes to locations in the Liberty City game map, though for the most part it is the same.

Grand Theft Auto Advance

Liberty City is also featured as the setting of Grand Theft Auto for the Game Boy Advance, released in October 2004. The game is set roughly one year before the events in GTA III. In Advance, all three islands that appeared in the Grand Theft Auto III depiction are featured, and the city is three times larger.

Because of the hardware limitation of the Game Boy Advance, the city assumes a classical top-down perspective, with roads running only horizontally and vertically, while the overall design and identity of the city remains similar to other GTA III-era renditions. Top-down gameplay meant that height-dependent or underground elements such as subway trains and tunnels (including the Porter Tunnel) were not implemented. Slopes are also absent in the Advance rendition.

Grand Theft Auto IV

A description of Liberty City in Grand Theft Auto IV will go here!

Other depictions

Remaining Grand Theft Auto games set in Grand Theft Auto III-canon, while set in completely difference locales, still mention Liberty City in dialog or feature a part of the city for a short period of time. Also, protagonists featured in these games have prominent experiences with the city for a period of time.

The Saint Mark's district of Portland, Liberty City in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Note the presence of fallen snow.

• In Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Tommy Vercetti, having just been released from prison, was dispatched to Vice City in 1986 by Sonny Forelli, who was shown inside the Forelli-run Marco's Bistro at Saint Mark's, Portland, Liberty City. Tommy had also earned the nickname the "Harwood Butcher", since he had murdered eleven men when he only came to kill one, evidently in the Harwood district of Portland which resulted in his 15-year jail sentence.
• In Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Carl "CJ" Johnson returns to his childhood home in Los Santos (Grand Theft Auto) after having spent five years in Liberty City, where he committed petty crime and worked for Don Salvatore Leone's son, Joey Leone. During the events of the game, Carl briefly returns to Liberty City to assassinate a high ranking Forelli Mafia member at Marco's Bistro, under orders from Salvatore Leone. The mission takes place in a section of southeast Saint Mark's, where Carl must fight through attacking Mafia members in Marco's Bistro and kill his target in the back lot of the restaurant. (This area of Saint Mark's is simply empty space in GTAIII and GTA: LCS)
• Liberty City is also featured in The Introduction, a machinima prequel of San Andreas. Set immediately before the events of the game, The Introduction shows both Carl Johnson stealing cars and mugging people in Liberty City and Salvatore Leone's house at Portland Beach, where he makes arrangements for his participation in a casino venture in Las Venturas.

Reception

The progression from a 2D perspective to a full 3D city in Grand Theft Auto III has been praised by critics, with The BBC calling it a huge breakthrough in scope and detail. The review described Liberty City as "a sort of extreme New York City." The Cincinnati Enquirer said that the city design makes the player feel like they're in a real city, with vehicles and buildings all to scale.

The Grand Theft Auto III Liberty City map was later ported to PlayStation Portable for Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories. MTV pointed out that though some people were concerned whether the city would need to be downscaled to adapt to the portable console's limitations, the version of Liberty City looks more detailed and as colorful as it did in Grand Theft Auto III.

References

• Grand Theft Auto III (PC version), Rockstar North (2002).
• Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (PC version), Rockstar North (2003).
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (PC version), Rockstar North (2005).
• GameFAQs' FAQs and guides on Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories. Retrieved January 6, 2006.
• GameFAQs' FAQs and guides on Grand Theft Auto Advance. Retrieved January 6, 2006.

External links

GTA rendition

• Official Liberty City overview, history and map

GTA III rendition

• Official Grand Theft Auto III website in HTML and Flash^‡ versions. Features dimetric maps of the City of Liberty and prominent locales.
• The Liberty Tree, Liberty City's newspaper in online format, circa October 2001, with its headquarters based in Bedford Point, Staunton^₣.
• Love Media, based in Bedford Point, Staunton.
• Francis International Airport
• Liberty City College, based in Liberty Campus, Staunton.
• Casino Oicho-Kabu^‡, (aka Kenji Casino), based in Torrington, Staunton.
• Capital Auto Sale$ (aka Easy Credit Auto), based in Harwood, Portland
• Ammu-nation, based in Portland and Staunton
• Pets Overnight, based in Pike Creek, Shoreside Vale^₣.
• Pogo the Monkey^‡, based in Pike Creek, Shoreside Vale^₣.
• Dormatron^‡, based in Pike Creek, Shoreside Vale^₣.

^‡ Requires Macromedia Flash Player [3]
^₣ Location retrieved from official GTA III website

GTA IV rendition

• Official Grand Theft Auto IV website
• Google Map of Liberty City - GTA IV version