Yes, GTA 6 may still be a while away, but that gives us plenty of time to go back and replay all of those Rockstar games we’ve loved from the past, or even check out some that we may have missed. But which parts of the famed Grand Theft Auto developers’ library should you prioritise first?
Well, we’ve gone ahead and ranked our favourite Rockstar games. From school-yard antics to tragic tales on the American frontier, here are the 10 best Rockstar games.
10. Manhunt
For a studio that’s no stranger to causing controversy due to the contents of its games, arguably none of Rockstar’s negative press surrounding GTA has come close to the furore that followed Manhunt. A stealth-action horror game in which you play as a death row inmate forced into partaking in a series of snuff films for the disembodied voice of a pre-Succession Brian Cox, it maybe shouldn’t have been a surprise that it garnered horrified reactions from the mainstream media, resulting in it being banned in several countries.
But the controversy only tells half of the story, because Manhunt is a good game, and a singular one in Rockstar’s library (although we don’t talk about its inferior sequel). A disturbing satire of the USA’s fascination with violence, it’s undeniably gnarly, but smartly psychological in its approach. Linear hallways create a very specific kind of tension that so many of the studio’s other works simply can’t due to their open-world nature. The result is tight, focused, and brutal action that works to horrifying effect. Well over 20 years old now, Manhunt has stuck long in the memory… although maybe that’s mostly due to how its stark box art staring out from store shelves scared the absolute crap out of me as a child.
9. GTA 3
Very few games have charted the future of game development quite like Grand Theft Auto 3. The open world of Liberty City plays host to a twisting story of gang warfare, drug running, and betrayal in the series’ first 3D entry. To say it broke new ground is an understatement, and the additional dimension and shift to a street-level camera is only the start of it. The PlayStation 2 had seen nothing of the like in terms of an immersive city sandbox full of opportunity. Its bounty of side missions and minigames blended with a main story that allowed for Rockstar to flex its storytelling chops like never before, telling the tale of Claude’s search for the truth through a cinematic lens and an all-star cast to match the story’s mob movie-inspired ambition (The Sopranos alumni Frank Vincent and Joe Pantoliano included).
GTA 3’s slice of fictional New York may seem like a small map to wander around in these days, but gradually unlocking its three islands, each with its own East Coast flavouring, felt like a miracle at the time. Yes, the repetitive, simplistic mission design and less-than-desirable vehicle handling may not have aged anything close to gracefully since its 2001 launch, but an engaging story and compelling (if archetypal) characters are still there to be seen. It’s still worth playing today to see where the roots of what GTA (and a dozen other open-world games) sprouted from.
8. Bully
Bully has often been described as “GTA, but in a school”, and to an extent, that’s exactly what it is. By substituting shotguns for slingshots and muscle cars for go-karts, it hits the right spot for anyone looking to wreak havoc at a private New England boarding school instead of running drugs across a fictional Miami or Los Angeles. The source of that havoc is Jimmy Hopkins, a troubled 15-year-old with a history of educational expulsions. Tasked with navigating a year at Bullworth Academy, a variety of classroom minigames, various clique quests, and hallway politics all serve to tell Bully’s story – one full of teenage charm and typical Rockstar social commentary.
Skating or cycling around the academy and its suburban surroundings is a delight, with memorable landmarks like a colourful funfair or the looming Happy Volts Asylum filling a sizable map that changes mood with the seasons as the story unfolds. This world is the result of Rockstar adapting the GTA formula for an unfamiliar, unconventional setting – look a little closer, and you’ll see well-worn mechanics twisted to fit school life (for example, attending lessons late risks the fury of teachers and prefects, which is Bully’s version of the Wanted system).
Bully is admittedly a little janky to play today, thanks to a less-than-robust camera and over-reliance on quicktime events, but it’s still a very fun time. And maybe if we’re really lucky, when Rockstar is done with GTA 6, we’ll get that sequel we’ve all wanted for almost 20 years now.
7. GTA 4
There’s a strong argument for Niko Bellic being the strongest of all the GTA protagonists – something I’d likely agree with. Whether all of GTA 4 stands as tall around him is up for further debate. 2008’s return to Liberty City took on the surprisingly bleak issues of the American Dream and what it means to be an immigrant in the modern Western world. It’s a story that delivers for the most part, providing a surprising amount of mature depth for a studio whose tales have historically been approached from a more pulpy angle. The city itself was a revelation for the time, packing a varied amount of detailed sights and sounds, even if in hindsight its visuals replicate the brown-grey blur that so many games from the Xbox 360 era suffer from.
It’s in objective design and general gameplay that GTA 4 is let down, though, which, for the most part, is a lot of driving people from A to B and assassinating single targets. Well, aside from the fantastic Three Leaf Clover bank heist mission, that is, which would go on to inspire the central hook of GTA 5. There’s no denying the longevity of Niko as a character, though, and the very real, grounded struggles he battles throughout his story. We certainly understand why he’d really rather go bowling with his cousin…
6. GTA Vice City
There are few video game locations as iconic as Vice City. Its neon-drenched roads, soundtracked by an all-timer collection of ‘80s hits, served as the setting for many people’s core memories of the PS2. Rockstar’s time-traveling trip back to the 1980s is anchored by protagonist Tommy Vercetti, played fantastically by Goodfellas’ Ray Liotta. Released only a year after the game-changing GTA 3, it’s remarkable how much of a step up Vice City achieved in just 12 months, not just in its star-studded cast and characterful storytelling, but also in the way its design injected life into every corner of its proxy Miami.
An engaging story filled with Scarface parallels brought with it a new sense of excess, which lent a blockbuster style to a series that was, in many ways, still finding its feet. Those early days are evident in the relatively shonky controls and dated mission design – during the campaign’s twilight hours, your attempts to wrestle control of businesses and balance money-making plates across the city don’t quite support the more ballistic ambition of the story. That doesn’t take away from Vice City’s overall charm, though; it remains a landmark piece of Rockstar history. And we can’t wait to go back to those beaches and clubs next year in GTA 6.
5. Max Payne 3
Rockstar decided to take Max Payne in-house for its third entry, having published the first two Remedy-developed games. Perhaps unsurprisingly, leaving Max’s Finnish creatives behind resulted in an entirely different tone, but one that is equally as thrilling. Gone are the pulpy comic book panels, melodramatic monologues, and moonlit greys of neo-noir New York, replaced by sensory overload thanks to blinding sunlight, dancefloor bullet ballets, and a now-synonymous soundtrack composed by Health. Building on the bullet-time foundations that propelled the series to success in a post-Matrix world, Max Payne 3 transports the tortured ex-NYPD officer to Brazil in the midst of a gritty gang war that leads to a larger conspiracy that’s bleaker than anything Sam Lake would have cooked up.
The decision to target societal ills reflects the difference between Rockstar and Remedy as developers – the former is always willing to take swipes at nations and their ingrained domestic problems, whereas the latter looks inwards for more cerebral tales of individual struggle. Both are valid, and both work in the world of Max Payne, which means all three entries are fantastic in their own way. They all share one thing in common, however: that unrivalled power trip of triggering that bullet time, leaping backwards through the air, and raining dual Uzi fire down on anyone standing in your way. Delicious.
4. GTA San Andreas
If the jump between GTA 3 and Vice City was big, then the chasm between Vice City and San Andreas requires industrial machinery to measure. In just two years, Rockstar had taken all of its previous Grand Theft Auto learnings, plus several huge swings, and blended them all together to concoct its first version of California. This vast (at least by PS2 standards) state is home to multiple cities that steadily unlock as you progress through its story. The road trip between them conveys a great sense of scale, as does the incredibly varied mission design and extensive cast of characters you meet during your tenures in each metropolis.
It isn’t just the sheer size that’s impressive, but also the gambles Rockstar took when it came to gameplay. San Andreas features elements pilfered from the RPG and life-sim genres, allowing you to sculpt your character and customise their appearance, adjusting their physique depending on how many weights you lift or Cluckin’ Bell buckets you feast on.
And then, of course, there’s CJ himself, a protagonist who lives on beyond the meme that follows him like a shadow. Authentically brought to life by rapper Young Maylay, his story is one of redemption and survival that pits him against some of the series’ most memorable adversaries, chief among them being Samuel L. Jackson’s despicable Officer Tenpenny. It all comes together to make one of Rockstar’s greatest games, and the best GTA of the PS2 era.
3. Red Dead Redemption
Rockstar had been displaying cinematic ambitions for many years before Red Dead Redemption’s arrival in 2010, so it was only natural that it would one day tackle one of the most fundamentally filmic of genres: the western. Taking heavy influence from the likes of The Wild Bunch, Red Dead’s cross-continent tale of an outlaw coming to terms with being the last of his kind takes fan-favourite John Marston to Mexico and back as he hunts down his former mentor, Dutch Van Der Linde. It’s a more rural setting than we’d previously come to expect from a Rockstar open-world, allowing for those cinematic flourishes to take hold and present an impressive artistic achievement. Bustling city streets made way for dusty canyons, and a stunning Woody Jackson score filled the space once dominated by constant radio chatter.
Red Dead Redemption’s slower pace allows for the story to play out elegantly, with Marston’s near-invisible foe hanging menacingly in the background, patiently awaiting their memorable snow-covered face-off. Then there’s the ending, which I’d never spoil here for those who’ve never had a chance to witness it, but safe to say it’s lived long in the memory as one of video games’ most impactful finales in the 15 years since.
The road to that point is paved by some admittedly fairly routine mission design and a lot of horse riding, but there’s still enough personality in its dead-eye shooting system and endlessly fun minigames (liar’s dice, here’s looking at you) to allow for Red Dead Redemption to age very gracefully. It lives on as one of Rockstar’s three finest achievements.
2. GTA 5
Grand Theft Auto 5 is a blockbuster in every sense of the word. Not just because of the colossal number of copies it’s sold, nor the amount of money it cost to make, but because of every aspect of its design. It wears excess proudly on its sleeve, reflected in the drive for money displayed by each of its three protagonists. This greed – itself Rockstar’s clearest criticism of capitalism and the obnoxious characters it produces – comes to a head in GTA 5’s signature heist missions, each a series of audacious action set pieces battling to upstage one another. These campaign highpoints blend in seamlessly with a Los Santos map bustling with life and teeming with charm – Rockstar’s signature humour oozes out of every sight and sound, from street corner billboards to radio station ramblings.
This sandbox has kept fans entertained ever since its construction in 2013, and thanks to the addition of GTA Online, it has expanded and improved consistently to this day. It’s created a whole new ecosystem for players to live in, take on increasingly complex heists, and even build race tracks that stretch and loop into the sky. It truly is its own ridiculous beast. But while it may be that expansive multiplayer mode that led to GTA 5’s enormous success, it’s Michael, Franklin, and Trevor’s story that has proven to have the most staying power, at least for us. It’s the best that a Grand Theft Auto campaign has ever been, and that has us excited to see how Rockstar will try to top it with GTA 6.
1. Red Dead Redemption 2
The culmination of all Rockstar’s work to date, Red Dead Redemption 2 took living, breathing video game worlds to the next level when it was released in 2018. The level of detail in its sprawling frontier is extraordinary, with every creature, both animal and human, reacting authentically to your every movement. This makes each interaction with these digital personalities feel astonishingly lifelike. This expertly crafted, turn-of-the-century western America is the stage for a whole host of memorable characters, both quirky and dangerous, but none stick in the mind as firmly as protagonist Arthur Morgan.
His journey represents the peak of Rockstar storytelling, displaying a level of complexity and nuance simply not present in any of the studio’s other games. The Van Der Linde gang’s trials and tribulations lead to a memorable set of dangerous missions thanks to the increasing desperation of its leader, Dutch. It’s a tale laden with standout chapters – a turf war between the Gray and Braithwaite families leads up to a manor house siege, a blockbuster bank heist in the major city of Saint Denis leads to an unexpected sojourn to the island of Guarma, and tensions between the native Wapiti Indians and American Army lead to flame-soaked shootouts. It would be hard to pick a single favourite from that list. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a vast, epic tapestry steeped in cinematic style, and the best game Rockstar has given us yet.
Simon Cardy is a Senior Editor at IGN who can mainly be found skulking around open world games, indulging in Korean cinema, or despairing at the state of Tottenham Hotspur and the New York Jets. Follow him on Bluesky at @cardy.bsky.social.
