So why is it, then, that we can’t seem to let it go?
Yet Hit & Run’s sustained relevance is, on its surface, a bit of an enigma.
I looked into the still-growing community keeping it alive today.
I figured I was alone in this.
Then I discovered Hit & Run’s extensive modding scene.
Like me, Reubs discovered Hit & Run in his youth.
“I had a pretty unsettled childhood and video games were a great escape,” Reubs tells me.
“I would sit there for hours and get completely lost in them.”
GTA III re-contextualised in-game violence.
But moral panics plagued GTA’s ascent to popularity, often centred on its sexual and violent content.
These controversies came to a head when PS2 modders founda hidden minigamecrudely simulating sex in San Andreas' code.
For some parents, the violence was already pushing it.
The promise of low-poly pornography, however, crossed a line.
There was always, however, Hit & Run.
Radical Entertainment’s Simpsons-themed interpretation of the GTA III formula is violent yet bloodless, funny but never R-rated.
Hit & Run’s Springfield is replete with references to the series' first twelve seasons.
Plow (season 4, episode 9) or Marge’s Canyonero (season 10, episode 15).
“Without them I probably never would have attempted the remake in the first place.”
Donut Team have produced a staggering number of Hit & Run mods over the years.
“Thats something that we deeply miss about the older internet.”
Nostalgia unites the Donut Team community.
I’ve slaughtered countless cowboys trekking through Read Dead Redemption 2’s Lemoyne County.
I’ve dismembered a dystopia’s worth of biohackers inCyberpunk 2077’s Night City.
