5 reasons why GTA Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories are great games

GTA Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories are some criminally underrated GTA titles that deserve some more recognition for their quality.

Following GTA San Andreas is a tough act to follow, so it's not surprising that many GTA fans would gloss over GTA Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories. That said, these two games still have some remarkable traits that make them enjoyable to play to this very day.

GTA Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories serve as the prequels to GTA 3 and GTA Vice City, respectively.

Unsurprisingly, some of their best traits are tied to how much they elevate those two titles. They even shine as individual games, which is a testament to how great they are.

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Five reasons why GTA Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories are terrific games

#5 - Add to the lore of their predecessors

Familiar faces also show up in these games (Image via Willzyyy)

It's one thing for players to hear about events that took place before, but it's another for them to participate in some of these events. Playing GTA Liberty City Stories adds a lot of context to some of the events that take place in GTA 3. Likewise, the same can be said of Vice City Stories to GTA Vice City.

GTA Liberty City Stories takes place in 1998, which is three years before the events of GTA 3. In Vice City Stories' case, it takes place in 1984, two years before GTA Vice City happens.

#4 - Good stories

While adding to the lore of their predecessors is nice, both GTA Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories excel as individual games when it comes to their stories.

In GTA Liberty City Stories, players follow Toni Cipriani's journey as he helps out Salvatore Leone by any means necessary.

Unlike Claude, Toni is a protagonist with a personality, which also allows the inhabitants of Liberty City to seem more lively.

Vice City Stories follows the story of Victor Vance, who is trying to earn money for his sick brother, Pete Vance. Its story is more grounded in realism, and it helps that it isn't too derivative of famous movies like GTA Vice City was.

#3 - Improved gameplay

Victor can swim, unlike Tommy (Image via Betaz)

While these two games aren't as polished as GTA San Andreas is, they're still a noticeable improvement over GTA 3 and GTA Vice City in terms of gameplay.

GTA Liberty City Stories had several quality-of-life features from past titles, which made it more playable than GTA 3 (not to mention much better graphics).

In Vice City Stories' case, the gameplay was different enough that it didn't feel like a clone. Here, the player could swim, have new fighting maneuvers, run new assets, and even do more side activities to pass the time.

#2 - Mobile games that weren't seen from a top-down perspective

It's still the good ole 3D style fans love (Image via Amazon)

Some GTA games on mobile devices are associated with a top-down perspective. GTA Advance came before these two games and GTA Chinatown Wars came after it.

Both of those titles were played from a classic top-down perspective that some GTA fans don't like.

However, neither GTA Liberty City Stories nor Vice City Stories suffered from this, even on their original PSP ports. Both games play like the good 3D style GTA fans are familiar with, which is something that elevates these two titles over the other two handheld games.

#1 - Great missions and activities

Like other GTA games, these two titles have terrific missions. As they're not mainline titles, the quality of their missions is incredibly important to one's enjoyment of the game.

The cutscenes in GTA Liberty City Stories might be simple in terms of animation, but they do a good job in elevating the characters involved. Likewise, the missions are great.

In GTA Vice City Stories' case, the animations are even better and the missions are even more creative.

Both games also add some great side activities and optional content to entertain the players.

Note: This article reflects the writer's personal views.