Grand Theft Auto - San Andreas (Europe / Australia)
PlayStation 2
🇩🇪🇬🇧🇪🇸🇫🇷🇮🇹
Reviewed in 2004
95
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✪ Reviewed on February 7, 2025
90
Rockstar's absolute masterpiece. San Andreas redefines open world with a massive map spanning three cities, RPG mechanics, culturally rich storytelling and total freedom of action. One of the greatest games ever created, essential on PS2.
Your verdict
Category
Open-World4 players18+
Co-op
Description
The absolute peak of the PS2 era, released in 2004 by Rockstar North. Carl "CJ" Johnson returns to the fictional state of San Andreas (Los Santos, San Fierro, Las Venturas) for a gangsta saga of over a hundred hours. A sprawling open world, light RPG layers and writing of exceptional scope: a generational classic.
Grand Theft Auto - San Andreas review
MAX
Art direction
★★★★★
"Iconic"
MAX
Music
★★★★★
"Legendary"
MAX
Story
★★★★★
"Masterful"
Three cities, deserts and countryside recreated with astonishing breadth, bathed in a nostalgic Californian light of the 90s. The coherence of the world and the teeming animation give it a life at every moment. This visual direction, vast and credible, redefined the scale of the open world.
A reflection of the early 1990s on the West Coast, the game rolls out an anthology of hip-hop, G-funk, soul and rock of striking authenticity. Each radio recreates the atmosphere of an era with rare accuracy, from gangsta rap to funk classics. This gigantic licensed selection remains one of the most striking in video games.
Back home after his mother's death, a young man finds himself swept up in gang wars and police corruption. A vast fresco on family, loyalty and social ascent, the tale embraces a whole era with unprecedented scope. Funny, brutal and surprisingly sincere, it has stayed cult.
Gameplay
"Excellent"
Fun
"From the very first seconds"
A playground of dizzying scale, spread across three cities and entire countryside, where you fly, shoot, swim, drive and improvise endlessly. The density of activities and the total freedom deliver an exhilarating feeling: everything seems possible, at any moment. Funny, immense and full of personality, one of the most memorable open worlds ever devised.
Addictiveness
"Obsessive"
Crossing an entire state by motorcycle, plane or on foot, juggling scripted missions, gangs and a thousand side activities, opens up a playground of rare density. Improving your stats, your gangs and your safehouses keeps reviving a fresh objective. A few frustrating missions weigh on things, but this excess and this total freedom remain a peak of pull that still works.
Difficulty
"Balanced"
Lifespan
"Massive"
Roaming three cities and an entire countryside to seize the streets unfolds an open world of mad density, brimming with missions and activities. Customising your avatar, hunting collectibles and wrapping everything up at 100% fills dozens of hours. That generosity, a series peak, earns the title a stubborn reputation as an inexhaustible sandbox.
A peak of Rockstar's criminal sandbox, whose sprawling fictional state, freedom of action and narrative ambition marked a generation and broke sales records. Still very widespread in the West, its interest lies in this status as a flagship work of the console rather than scarcity. An essential piece for open-world fans wanting a monument of the PS2 era.
Better with friends
A vast criminal playground that slips in a two-player free mode where you sow chaos side by side, with no goal but fun. The improvised cooperation beats any scripted mission: boosting each other into a heist, fleeing the cops together or simply triggering the most memorable mayhem. Huge and generous, it turns the sandbox into a shared playground you never tire of exploring.
A cult cover
In its checkerboard of vignettes bathed in khaki green, San Andreas summons lowriders, gangs and sun-flattened avenues. The warm dominant and the neighborhood faces root the epic at once in the 1990s American ghetto. Teeming and instantly legible, the composition has become one of gaming's most iconic covers.
A questionable morality
Climbing the criminal ladder here means borrowing every vehicle without asking, running shady errands and sowing cheerful chaos across an entire city left at your mercy. The game wraps it all in a sharp satire, which never stops the player from stringing together crimes with a delighted grin, perfectly at home in the role of the thug.
