Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories was created by Rockstar Leeds and Rockstar North. The game was released in 2005 on the PSP portable console (the game was announced as an exclusive to this device), and in 2006 a version was released for the PlayStation 2.

The action takes place in the city of Liberty City, which was modeled mainly on New York. This city, by the way, most often appears in games of the GTA series — GTA 3 (2001) and GTA 4 (2008) took place here.

In Liberty City, like Liberty City Stories, the calendar shows 1998. The main character, Toni Cipriani returns to the city after several years of quiet life, which he had to spend after the murder of a gang member, committed as a favor to Don Salvatore Leone. Don, pleased with Tony, gives him a permanent job.

Liberty City Stories gives you a chance to meet characters who have previously appeared in GTA games. Among them: Luigi Goterelli — nightclub manager and owner of a large prostitution business; Kenji and Asuka Kasen — the head of the local branch of the Yakuza gang and his sister; Avery Carrington is the owner of a large construction company who moved to Liberty from Vice City.

The city featured in Liberty City Stories is somewhat different from the city in GTA 3. Since the action takes place several years earlier than its predecessor, some places have not yet been built, including the bridge connecting Portland Island and Staunton Island ). You can get from one island to another using a ferry that runs between the islands. The game also has a small “new” district of Little Italy, which is missing in GTA 3.

The gameplay of GTA Liberty City Stories is similar to that of all other games in the series, and retains characteristic features such as complete freedom of movement around the city and the ability to complete missions in a different order. The game has 70 main story missions, but various additional missions have not been forgotten, such as working part-time as representatives of various professions (taxi driver, medic, policeman), stealing custom cars, collecting secret packages.

In addition to the standard secondary tasks for the series, GTA Liberty City Stories also introduced very original ones — for example, the opportunity to dress up as a vigilante and, together with a partner, catch troublemakers in the city, or the opportunity to work as a garbage man (finding corpses in garbage cans, the main character prefers to take them to a landfill instead of contacting the police — pretty disgusting, right?).

There is no opportunity to purchase real estate here; you have to save in three houses, which become available as you progress. There is also no way to buy clothes for the main character, or change his appearance in any way.

Tony, who cannot swim, can conquer the water element in Liberty City Stories only on boats, of which there are four. In total, the game features 82 vehicles (versus 54 in GTA 3), including cars and sports cars, trucks, helicopters and airplanes. Almost all types of transport will be familiar to fans of the series, but the appearance and names of some cars may differ. Thus, the Mafia Sentinel car in Liberty City Stories is called Leone Sentinel.

The weapons arsenal includes the usual types of firearms and bladed weapons.

GTA Liberty City Stories' multiplayer mode (only available on the PSP version) allows you to wreak havoc on the streets of Liberty City in online game types such as Deathmatch, Defend the Base, Capture the Flag flag). Other online game types: Turn-Based Survival (one player is randomly selected as a "prey" for others to hunt), Checkpoint Race, Car Collection (stealing cars, the one with the most money wins) and Turn-based Tank Survival (tank capture).