10 Great Video Games That Almost Never Happened At All

5. Grand Theft Auto

Plagued with controversy from the offset, the GTA series never had an easy ride. Gaming's greatest underdog had troubles long before the media tried to have them shut down: their very own production company was at it first. "The writers were driving it one way. The level designers were driving at another way. They weren't meeting in the middle," said creative director Gary Penn, in a video interview with the Guardian. One of the first open world games of its time, not a single milestone was met during the game's protracted four year development. "We'd have conference calls at least once a week with the US. They wanted to kill it every week. Every week they wanted to kill this game, and we'd have to argue to try and keep it going, because we had some faith." Much like Goldeneye, which was released a mere two months earlier, the development team for GTA was made up of young, inexperienced staff trying to create something that hadn't been done before. They eventually managed to struggle towards something truly impressive through a painful process of trial and error. While not on the level of Rare's masterpiece (for that they would have to wait until the groundbreaking GTA 3), this set the stage for all sandbox games to follow. When you look at the gaming industry today and see it dominated by first person shooters and open-world titles, it's funny to think that it all stemmed from the efforts of two small and unsure development teams.