The three cities featured in the game are Liberty City (based on New York City), San Andreas (based on San Francisco) and Vice City (based on Miami). From Grand Theft Auto III (2001) onwards, each game was set in a redesigned version of one of these cities (though San Andreas was expanded into a state with three cities separated by countryside).
The star-based "wanted level" system in the game was influenced by The Blues Brothers (1980). In that movie, Jake (John Belushi) and Elwood Blues (Dan Aykroyd) are chased by the police, SWAT and the army in the film's climatic chase sequence.
The original concept for this game was that the player was supposed to be the police, who had to go around catching car looters, robbers, gang members and so on. In the late development stages, following a heated debate, the team agreed among themselves that it would be better to reverse the roles.
When playing the game with the German language settings, it is not possible to choose the female protagonists Ericka.
As a way of saying thank you to the many fans of the series, Rockstar Games released a freeware version of the first Grand Theft Auto game on their website. However, they later removed it a few years later once they realised they could continue to make money from it.