Grand Theft Auto San Andreas - XB1

ESRB Rating: M (Mature)
Release Date:
Moby Score (1-10): 8.5
Player Score (1-5): 4
Genre(s): Action

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas takes place in the early 1990s in the fictional state of San Andreas. The player controls Carl “C.J.” Johnson, a former gang member who left his home city of Los Santos for Liberty City in an attempt to distance himself from his past. When C.J. learns that his mother has been killed, he returns to Los Santos for her funeral. There, he finds his old neighborhood weakened, his family divided, and his former gang, the Grove Street Families, losing ground to rival gangs. Harassed by corrupt police officers and pulled back into the problems he tried to leave behind, C.J. resumes his criminal life while trying to rebuild his gang, protect his family, and uncover the truth behind his mother’s death.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is an open-world action game and the fifth main entry in the Grand Theft Auto series. The basic structure remains similar to earlier games: the player explores a large “sandbox” environment, steals vehicles, completes missions, and advances through a crime-focused story. The game world is much larger than in Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, encompassing three major cities: Los Santos, San Fierro, and Las Venturas - as well as countryside, small towns, deserts, forests, rivers, and mountains. Although the world is large, access to the full state opens gradually as the story advances, with new cities, countryside regions, and activities becoming available over time.

Environmental interaction is also expanded, as C.J. can now swim, dive, climb, and access more parts of the world than previous protagonists. Missions vary widely in structure and gameplay, including car chases, races, robberies, stealth sequences, gang warfare, shootouts, vehicle pursuits, and large-scale set pieces. The range of usable vehicles has also expanded, including cars, lowriders, bicycles, motorcycles, boats, helicopters, airplanes, trains, monster trucks, and other special vehicles.

Gang territory becomes a recurring system in Los Santos, with the player able to provoke turf wars, capture neighborhoods from rival gangs, and defend Grove Street territory from counterattacks. Criminal actions also attract police attention through a wanted-level system. As the wanted level rises, the response escalates from patrol officers to roadblocks, helicopters, SWAT teams, federal agents, and military forces.

As in previous games, the player can take part in many activities outside the main story. Returning side activities include taxi driving, vigilante missions, paramedic missions, firefighting, races, and vehicle-based challenges. San Andreas adds many new optional activities and character-development systems. C.J. can work out at gyms to improve his physique and stamina, practice with weapons to increase proficiency, learn new fighting moves, gamble in casinos, purchase clothing, get haircuts and tattoos, and customize vehicles. He also needs to eat periodically, while overeating or neglecting exercise can affect his body shape.

C.J. can also purchase safehouses and certain properties, giving the player additional save points, garages, income sources, or access to optional missions. The game includes light role-playing elements through C.J.’s statistics and appearance. Attributes such as stamina, muscle, fat, lung capacity, driving skill, flying skill, and weapon skill improve through use or training. These changes can affect how C.J. moves, fights, drives, aims, swims, and is perceived by other characters. The player can also form romantic relationships with certain female characters by taking them on dates and meeting their preferences.

San Andreas expands the series’ sense of place and period detail. Its cities and regions are inspired by real-world locations in California and Nevada, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and the surrounding rural and desert areas. The early-1990s setting is reflected through the music, fashion, gang culture, vehicles, radio stations, and satire of American media, law enforcement, celebrity, gambling, and urban life. The soundtrack is delivered through in-vehicle radio stations, mixing period music, talk shows, commercials, and parody programming that help establish the era and tone.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was released on numerous platforms, with later versions adapting the controls, display options, visuals, audio, and technical features for different hardware. Some versions also include local two-player free-roam or rampage activities, allowing a second player to join briefly in specific locations.

*** Data by MobyGames.com ***