Multiplayer
Multiplayer is one of the most wanted features by fans of the Grand Theft Auto series to be included in a GTA game.
Official Support
While Rockstar did include multiplayer support with the free download release of GTA2 for the PC, no modern GTA game yet has featured a true officially supported multiplayer mode whereby people from anywhere in the world can play against each other. There have been hints that official support was going to be implemented in GTA3, however nothing materialised from it. Small implementations have also been made and are detailed below.
GTA2
The first game to officially support multiplayer modes was the PC version of GTA2 which was released as a free download in December 2004.
GTA3
It is now known that the PC version of Grand Theft Auto 3 was at one point going to have a multiplayer mode. However, for whatever reason, it appears that the developers at Rockstar North (then DMA Design) decided to stop developing the feature.
This is evidenced by the fact that one can view textures related to multiplayer mode menu screens in the file models/menu.txd which can be opened using a TXD viewer. Additionally, strings found in the game's GXT files suggest some of modes and options that would have been available, shown by this excerpt from the american.gxt file:
FEM_MAP - "Select Map"
FEM_MP - "MULTIPLAYER"
FEN_CON - "Connection"
FEN_GAM - "Find Game"
FEN_GNA - "Game Name:"
FEN_NAM - "Name:"
FEN_NCI - "NOT CONNECTED TO THE INTERNET"
FEN_NET - "Network"
FEN_PLA - "Number of players:"
FEN_PLC - "Player color"
FEN_PLS - "Player settings"
FEN_STA - "START GAME"
FEN_TY0 - "Deathmatch"
FEN_TY1 - "Deathmatch stealth"
FEN_TY2 - "Team Deathmatch"
FEN_TY3 - "Team Deathmatch stealth"
FEN_TY4 - "Stash the cash"
FEN_TY5 - "Capture the Flag"
FEN_TY6 - "Rat Race"
FEN_TY7 - "Domination"
GTA San Andreas' co-op mode
The PS2 and Xbox versions of GTA San Andreas featured a co-op mode, which allowed 2 players to either 'free roam' or go on a 'rampage'. It was limited by the fact that both players had to stay within a reasonable proximity of each other.
Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories
In 2005, Liberty City Stories was released on the PSP and featured a multiplayer mode for up to 6 players through WiFi ad-hoc mode. A total of 7 modes of play were available. In 2006, Vice City Stories was released on the PSP with the same functionality as its predecessor, though had an additional 3 mods of play available.
GTA IV
Multiplayer has been confirmed as a feature in Grand Theft Auto IV, however no major details are yet known on what sort of modes or features it will possess. The only thing currently known is that it will not be a massively online multiplayer game.
Unofficial Modifications
Multi Theft Auto (MTA)
Vice City Multiplayer (VC-MP)
San Andreas Multiplayer (SA-MP)
GTA Tournament (gtaT)
Attempts by other teams
External Links