“I Was Skeptical About the Transformation of GTA” – Original Xbox Designer on GTA 3

In a recent documentary series, Power On: The Story Of Xbox, an interesting story about Grand Theft Auto 3 has been revealed- about how the development team behind the console rejected Rockstar’s pitch for bringing Grand Theft Auto 3 to the platform.

In the documentary, Seamus Blackley (the designer of the original Xbox) admitted that he was wrong about passing on the opportunity, as he was skeptical about the transformation of the franchise from 2D to 3D. Additionally, he elaborated on the same over on Twitter, explaining that the entire Xbox team shared the same sentiment, so he isn’t exactly the only one at fault here.

Grand Theft Auto 3 was the last game Rockstar pitched to the team, and interestingly enough, Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser was really pushing for an Austin Powers game that, sadly, never came to fruition. Similar stories have also come to light recently, with one of them being about how Microsoft’s executives openly lied to the press about the development of Xbox.

NGL- I was skeptical about the transformation of GTA – a 2D game – into 3D. And I was wrong. But so was everyone else in that room. It goes to show you what big experts we all were.

— Seamus Blackley (@SeamusBlackley) December 15, 2021