Chinatown Wars

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars was developed by Rockstar Leeds for the Nintendo DS with Rockstar North, and it was announced at Nintendo's press conference on 15 July 2008. It reached North America on 17 March 2009, Australia on 19 March and Europe on 20 March. It is the thirteenth game in the series, released after Grand Theft Auto IV, and the first handheld entry since Vice City Stories in 2006.

A stolen sword and a fight over the Triad throne

Huang Lee, a Triad member, arrives in Liberty City in 2009 after his father has been murdered. His job is to hand an ancient sword, the Yu Jian, to his Uncle Kenny so the family keeps its hold on the city's Triads. The sword is stolen as soon as he lands; Huang himself is robbed and left for dead. Hunting for it pulls him into a power struggle over who will succeed the Triad boss Hsin Jaoming.

Dan Houser and David Bland wrote the game, and Leslie Benzies and Gordon Hall produced it.

Liberty City from above, in cel-shading

The map is a scaled-down version of the Liberty City from Grand Theft Auto IV, without Alderney. The game drops the camera behind the character in favour of a fully rotatable view angled down at the action, which partly recalls the first Grand Theft Auto games. The DS version is also cel-shaded, with black outlines that give it a comic book look. Cel-shading was a first for the series.

Hotwiring on the touch screen, dealing on the street

A lot of the work falls to the touch screen. Hotwiring a car, unscrewing an ignition, hacking an immobiliser and throwing a Molotov cocktail are all small minigames, and the DS microphone can be used to whistle for a taxi. Huang carries a PDA, which is how weapons are ordered, through an in-game Ammu-Nation website.

Several of the series' habits are swapped for something new. Destroying CCTV cameras takes the place of the hidden packages. To lose a wanted level, players ram and destroy police cars, one car for each star. Huang cannot fly aircraft.

The largest addition is drug dealing. Players buy and sell six types of drugs around the city and make a profit from local supply and demand.

That mechanic drew criticism from the anti-drug charity Drugsline. Dan Houser said Rockstar had wanted a system like it in a GTA game for a long time.

Ghostface Killah on the theme, deadmau5 on the radio

The opening theme, "Chinatown Wars", is performed by Ghostface Killah and MF Doom and produced by Oh No.

The DS radio has music by:

• deadmau5
• Ticklah
• The Alchemist
• The Prairie Cartel
• Truth and Soul Records

The PSP version adds:

• Anvil
• Tortoise
• DFA Records
• Turntables on the Hudson
• DJ Khalil

A Metascore of 93, but weak US sales

The DS version has a Metascore of 93, the highest of any Nintendo DS game on Metacritic. Eurogamer gave it 10/10 and IGN US 9.5/10, while IGN UK called it "a masterpiece of handheld gaming". It won Best Handheld Game at the 2009 Spike Video Game Awards and was named GameSpot's DS Game of the Year.

Sales in the US were lower than expected, just under 90,000 units in the first two weeks.

From PSP to phones and tablets

The PSP version arrived on 20 October 2009 in North America and 23 October in Europe. It gave up the cel-shaded graphics and added extra missions and a PSP-only character, Melanie Mallard.

The game then moved to phones and tablets. It came to iPhone and iPod Touch on 17 January 2010 and to iPad on 9 September 2010. War Drum Studios ported it to Android on 18 December 2014, released alongside an iOS update that added Retina support and controller support.