Welcome to one of the greatest gaming adventures of your life - with the release of Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy on Xbox, including Grand Theft Auto III available for the first time on Microsoft's black box of wonder, there's simply no excuse not to immerse yourself into the gang warfare and street violence of this unparalleled experience, which is much imitated but never bettered.

Your journey begins in Liberty City, with Grand Theft Auto III. Although this game is showing its age just a little in the looks department, it's still just as ahead of its time and playable as when it was first released. Taking on the role of a convicted felon, you're sprung from a police transport and must make your way up the crime ladder, carrying out missions for various crime lords as you establish your reputation as a man that can get the job done.

The first time you enter Liberty City, you'll be amazed by the level of detail lavished upon the cityscape in every respect. A range of people from all walks of life wander the streets, while you can jack any vehicle you please, from regular cars to suped-up sports numbers and big trucks, plus everything in between. Many different buildings line the streets, including ones you can make use of, like Ammu Nation to buy weapons and the Pay 'N' Spray, where you can get your vehicle repaired, along with a new paint job to remove your wanted level; you see, if you commit too many high profile crimes you'll become notorious and the police will hound your every move, eventually killing or busting you, at which point you end up at the hospital or in jail, released without weapons for a fee or bribe accordingly.

The range of quirky characters you meet as you progress through the missions, as well as the different tasks you must undertake, is simply outstanding, and things never get old, because the variety of your missions is very impressive - car chases, gun fights, sniping, assassinations, gang warfare, speedboat chases, rigging a car with a bomb, going on a flamethrower killing spree, escorting an ally on a mission, the list just goes on and on, and the different areas of the city are huge, each divided into themed districts complete with their own population and gangs. For the full scoop on this fantastic first instalment of the trilogy, head over to my full and detailed review of Grand Theft Auto III now.

Once you've had enough of Liberty City, it's time to head over to Vice City and prepare for a nostalgic blast from the past, as Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is set in the Eighties. This theme is lovingly crafted in every respect, from the gaudy Hawaiian shirts and bad suits to the many vehicles on offer. The gameplay doesn't drastically change in Vice City, although a few new elements are introduced, such as being able to rob stores and buy properties. The many radio stations on offer (as there were in the first game) are now all themed to the Eighties and there's such a great collection of classic tunes on offer that anyone who grew up in the Eighties will feel right at home. As before, the fake commercials are hilarious, the talk shows make for highly amusing listening and the quality of the production of all the radio stations and their various quirky DJs is superb, from the biting script to the excellent and totally convincing voice acting.

This time you play Tommy Vercetti, freshly released from prison and sent to Vice City to be kept out of the way until your rep cools down a bit. Right from the off you're betrayed and thrown into a sticky situation, and again the story takes the format of seeing you carrying out a huge variety of increasingly tricky missions for a range of quirky crime lords, all set against the vibrant backdrop of Vice City. For all the details you need, head over to my full review of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

While Vice City was little more than a slight evolution, the final instalment in this incredible trilogy is a complete revolution - Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is far bigger, deeper and better than the previous two games and takes the series to groundbreaking new places that no one could have imagined it would go - other than Rockstar, of course!

San Andreas casts you as Carl 'CJ' Jackson and you've just returned to Los Santos after a few years in Liberty City, brought back by the death of your mother at the hands of rival gang members. The theme chosen for San Andreas is one of urban gangs, set to a backdrop of rap, soul and R&B, and it's all very fresh and new, taking a complete departure in style and substance from the previous games, while still retaining the familiar foundation we've come to know and love.

The story is better than before, as are the characters in your own gang and those of your rivals, as well as the corrupt cops that pop up periodically to give you a hard time, and while the main missions still unfold in much the same way as before, the variety is unprecedented, with so many imaginative and completely different missions that any sense of repetition from the previous games is totally eliminated here.

However, the real reason that San Andreas is so much more than what came before is the addition of a bunch of RPG elements, including full character customisation for not only your clothing and hairstyle, but your body type as well - you can stuff your face and get fat, or hit the gym and get fit, and your body shape changes accordingly. Everything from driving, riding bikes (push cycles and motorcycles) and swimming to every weapon you can use and even your respect (which allows you to recruit gang members to help you out) is a skill to be improved and the more you perform each action, the better you become at it. Stealth is introduced, including hiding in the shadows and sneaking up for stealth kills from behind, you can get yourself a girlfriend and take her on dates to keep her happy, you can get a low rider car and kit it out with extensive customisation options, you can burgle people's houses at night - and that's just the tip of the iceberg! There is so much to do here that it could never be listed in a review without taking several hours to read, but I've done my best to condense the most vital info into my full review of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. So have a read and then come back for the final verdict!

Done that? Good! It's safe to say that not only is Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy a collection of three of the best games ever created, but it also represents the best value for money you're ever likely to see in gaming history - with around 1000 hours of gaming if you were to take all three games to 100% completion (that's right, I said a THOUSAND!) it's hard to imagine that any single purchase will offer this kind of value ever again, other than subsequent releases of GTA collections. From the free roaming, extensively detailed and beautifully crafted cityscapes that offer increasing freedom to carry out a huge range of side missions or just hang out and cruise the streets to the incredible variety of main missions to complete in order to progress the story, from the range of vehicles and weapons on offer to the total freedom in approaching each mission however you like, there is simply no other gaming series out there like Grand Theft Auto, and every self-respecting gamer over 18 needs to have a copy of this stylishly packaged collection on their shelf.

Reviewed by Geoff Holland for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).