Dan Howser Reveals How 9/11 Changed The GTA Series Forever

This article was first published on Gamefa Gamefa: News, Game Reviews, Movies, Movies, and Series at the link Dan Howser Revealed: How 9/11 Changed the GTA Series Forever. It's safe to say that there is no cover art style more recognized in the gaming industry than the GTA series. A collection of gridded and paneled images containing characters and locations from all over the map, from the release of GTA 3 in 2001 to the game

It's safe to say that there is no cover art style more recognized in the gaming industry than the GTA series.

The set of gridded and paneled images containing characters and locations from every part of the map, which has adorned the box of every version of this game since the release of GTA 3 in 2001 until the highly anticipated game GTA 6, is etched in our minds. However, it almost all looked completely different.

As part of the IGN30 Icons special program, IGN spoke with Dan Hauser, the former VP of Rockstar Games and the writer of almost all of the studio's games from 1999 until the release of Red Dead Redemption 2 in 2018. While recalling the developer's most famous franchise, Grand Theft Auto, Houser shared how he felt about elements of his creation spilling over into the real world.

The GTA series has become part of a wider cultural fabric. I mean, you kind of see that in YouTube clips and anything else that has a game HUD on it, or people using logos and stuff like that. When you go to any major tourist area, there are t-shirts available inspired by the GTA cover design. So, I think you've seen this phenomenon creep in since about 10 years ago.

However, the bold and colorful style of these cover designs came from the heart of a tragedy; As Houser revealed, the initial appearance of the GTA 3 box had to be changed at the last minute due to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York.

The interesting thing is that the design on the cover, which became the symbol of the GTA series, was designed by Steven Bliss in only two evenings (two days); Because the previous design was probably too offensive for a post-9/11 release, as it featured burning buildings.

Therefore, if the September 11 incident had not happened, the same previous plan would not have been a problem. As a result, that fragmented look and squares that became so iconic only appeared because of 9/11.

These changes, along with some tweaks to the game's core content, meant a short delay in GTA 3's release from the originally planned date (i.e., October 3, 2001) to October 22. Although the delay was only a few weeks, it put additional pressure on Rockstar Games and Howser, who were by no means certain that the game would achieve the unprecedented and historic success it eventually achieved.

I remember that in early 2001, Tik-To was on the verge of bankruptcy. We were working hard to finish the game, but we thought it would be an amazing title; So we took it to E3, but no one on the show floor noticed it. This was somewhat disappointing. Then the game came out six or seven months later, right around the time after 9/11.

Of course, the story of GTA 3 takes place in Liberty City, which is a fictional version of New York City; So you can understand why a change in approach to the game was necessary. Houser explained:

A few parts of the game's content would have been fine under normal circumstances, but right in the aftermath of 9/11, they seemed perhaps a bit over the top. So we had to remove them. The team members got together to clean these up and edit a few lines of dialogue; We did a quick check on the content and thought things were in order. Finally, the game was released in October 2001. Its sales kind of plateaued until Christmas 2001 and early 2002, but it never stopped selling. It wasn't that one particular week's sales were huge, but that it continued to grow strongly each week.

Houser detailed some of these changes in an interview with Edge magazine in 2011. He said at that time:

As far as I can remember, we changed the color of the police cars so they didn't look exactly like NYPD cars, modified the flight path of a plane so it didn't look like it was flying towards or behind a skyscraper, and removed a mission because it referred to terrorists.

The first 3D version of the Grand Theft Auto series was not the only media product that was forced to make changes following these terrorist attacks. Other video games such as Electronic Arts' Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 had to redesign their packaging, and in Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, sections involving the destruction of parts of Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty were completely removed.

Other similar cases include Sam Raimi's Spider-Man trailer, which had to be re-edited to remove the scene of a helicopter being caught in a giant spider web between the World Trade Center towers. Men in Black 2 underwent extensive reshoots for similar reasons, and sequel plans for both True Lies and Forrest Gump were canceled altogether.

The GTA game series has an adult age rating; Therefore, it is necessary for families to monitor the access of children and teenagers.