10 Most Memorable GTA Missions: Ranked Worst To Best
8. Sayonara Salvatore - GTA III
Assassination missions are a staple of the GTA series, and the mission Sayonara Salvatore from GTA III, while not being particularly long or complicated, is one that demonstrated to gamers the extent of how truly open world the game was.
It's short but sweet, mostly because you can approach it in the way that best suits your play style.
After being betrayed by the Mafia kingpin Salvatore Leone, Claude sides with the Yakuza, and is sent by their leader Asuka to assassinate Salvatore as a sign of loyalty. The goal is simple: wait for him to leave a gentlemen's club and take him out. This doesn't sound like that great of a mission at face value, but its beauty comes with the freedom to execute the assassination how you want.
Sure, you can take him out quickly with a sniper if you so desire, but you can also run him down or blow up his car with a well placed rocket launcher.
It's up to you to decide how far you want to take it, and that's what made missions like these stand out. It gave the player the ability to diverge from a set path and explore possibilities, which is how the GTA series was able to capture the attention of gamers way back in 2001. It was revolutionary at the time, and marked the beginning of a design choice that would go on to become more impressive with each new instalment.