By Jamie Kennett

A group of GTA-loving fellows in New York City recently began work on a mural for the series’ new release, which consisted of a mock-up of Grand Theft Auto V’s box art. The design looked convincing, and could have quite easily fooled a large number of people into thinking it was the genuine article. That was until yesterday, when Rockstar Games befittingly released the actual cover for the game, which is set to hit stores on the 17th September.

By Jamie Kennett

It may be a slightly over-romanticised account of the Great Depression, but Mafia is one of my favourite games and for years has been at the top of my list of potential film adaptions. I even remember using the game’s prologue for the basis of a short story for some English coursework once. It’s essentially an interactive film, not in a Heavy Rain way, but in the way the game’s laid out. It’s presented in a series of chapters that possess all the facets of a great movie; it has the perfect balance of action, drama and character, all with enough room for the plot to develop into something marvellous.

By Jamie Kennett

The last in my line of Rockstar Games productions, Red Dead Redemption is the classic tale of a reformed man going on an against-all-odds quest to right all his previous wrongs and set his former life to rest. Staged as a Western, against the staggeringly beautiful backdrop of the American southwest and northern Mexico, it’s set in the summer of 1911 as the Old West enters its death throes.

By Jamie Kennett

We all secretly agree that crime dramas make the best stories, so here’s my third choice with Sleeping Dogs.

The game is an undercover police drama uniquely infused with martial arts-based action. Set in modern-day Hong Kong, it tells the story of unorthodox detective Wei Shen as he attempts to infiltrate the notorious Sun On Yee triad (an organisation heavily based on the real-life Sun Yee On). Wei Shen is the classic anti-hero; he grew up amongst the very people who are now part of the organisation he’s investigating. He moved to San Francisco in his youth, and later joined the SFPD as an undercover police officer, infiltrating triad gangs on the West Coast. From there he transferred to Hong Kong, the centre of all the world’s triad activity, to investigate the organisations rife in the city.

By Jamie Kennett

I can assure you it is simply a coincidence that the majority of the games I’ve chosen have been produced by Rockstar Games in one way or another. The reason I’ve chosen them is because of the bond they all share in great writing, and those of you who have played and appreciate L.A. Noire will understand why it’s my next choice.

The game received a lot of bad press amid the critical acclaim it was also subject to. A lot of people were unhappy with the lack of mystery the supposed detective thriller had about it and a lot of the same people criticised it for the occasionally lazy storytelling, but I believe that was only a problem because of the retrospectively misguided way that the people at Team Bondi went about presenting said story.

By Jamie Kennett

There have been plenty of video games in recent years that have only come into existence because they’re (more often than not) the lovechild of a massive gaming corporation and a strategically chosen high-grossing film. By-and-large, the majority of them have been quite successful; The Godfather and Scarface: The World is Yours come to mind as two examples of open-world action games that were great in their own right. Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth and its sequel proved themselves as great pieces of strategy gaming and Star Wars: Battlefront (including the second instalment) made for some memorable playing in its innovative combination of shooter and strategy. In review, it would seem that films and video games go hand-in-hand. It is, however, a strictly one-way relationship. It’s rare thing to find a successful film that’s been adapted from a video game; the results are often not as pretty as one might think, and they’re best left forgotten. That being said, however, I think the fault lies in the choice of game, and not the end result that lies in the film it’s adapted into.