Hello, firstly: thanks for reading and obligatory Steam ID all rolled into one.

As the title suggests, I'm hoping some kind soul will gift me a copy of Grand Theft Auto V on PC. I'd like to explain my history with the series and why I'm so eager to get my hands on it.

Cloud of smoke

Cast your mind back to the sepia tones of 1997. As a 14 year old getting into PC gaming for the first time (16GB of RAM yo!) I sat watching the news while eating dinner. Shock! Horror! Murder simulator released! Points given to the player for killing innocent people!

I'm watching the video footage of this game on the news and wondering if I'm looking at the same game that everyone is complaining about. 2D sprites? This was the age of the Playstation where everything was being generated in block hexagonals... What on Earth was this?

A friend of mine came round a few weeks later, with a copy of GTA tucked under his arm. I installed. I played. I fell in love. I could go anywhere and I could do anything. It was glorious, filled with arcade-like frenetic energy, high speed chases and exciting gun battles. I started getting friends to lug their PC's over so we could play the multiplayer. Cannonball run - what an eye-opener. This was a freeform world of madcap gun battles and car chases, but now there were friends involved. Speeding down highways, slamming each other off ramps, setting up road blocks well ahead of the race... The laughter went on for months.

Cloud of smoke

It's 1999. I'm hearing that Grand Theft Auto 2 is about to be released and I'm cursing the fact that my PC is a withering away. I stay away from the game, kidding myself that I don't need it and it's just going to be more of the same. Fast-forward 2 years, I pick up a Dreamcast with Virtua Fighter and Grand Theft Auto 2 on the cheap. First impressions: It's more of the same. Delving deeper, I realised how much had been added with the gang wars/reputation. Now, my actions had verifiable consequences outside the standard "You Died". If I helped out one side more than another, I could expect those guys turning up on my doorstep with a machete aimed at my peepers. The graphics had been overhauled, there was lighting effects! Lighting effects! Can you even?

To this day, GTA2 is still my third favourite GTA. It was the pinnacle of the top down GTA games as far as I'm concerned, and even the DS version never bettered it for me... But things were about to change when the Playstation 2 came along.

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It's 2001 and I'm sat in the University's student bar wondering what I was doing there. I'd been shipped off to Uni by my parents but my heart wasn't in it. I didn't know what I wanted to do, I didn't know what I wanted to study, but there I was - spending my Student Loan on cheap pints and staring forlornly at my future. Over in the corner, I spy some sort of TV setup. I take a wander over and there in a plastic case is a PS2 replete with controller. Inside the PS2 is Grand Theft Auto III.

I'd not read too much about GTAIII, I'd been wrapped up in my own little world at that point. I was about to wrap myself up in another little world...

WOW

Grand Theft Auto III was the definitive shift. It was the Empire Strikes Back of the GTA world. It didn't just change the franchise, it changed the video-game landscape. It changed me. For the first time in years, I was hearing conversations take place amongst people who never really played games: What's your favourite car to drive? Have you found the hidden plane? What's your longest run at 5 stars?

It was a believable world. A believable story. A level of criminal cool that had never been attained before. Being stuck in a place I didn't want to be, but having this other world I could escape to (even if it was in a sweaty student bar) was a lifeline to me. I got myself a PS2 a few years later, and GTA III was the first thing I picked up, and the only thing I played for an age.

Cloud of smoke

It's 2004, Phil Collins is booming from the stereo as I race down neon-lit streets. If Grand Theft Auto III introduced us to the world-building of Grand Theft Auto's new 3D direction, the Vice City was the introduction of culture. As someone born in the early 80s, I was in my element. As well as a bigger world, and even more things to do, we now had a videogame where you wouldn't want to leave your car because a really cool song just came on. There's a vital mission about to take place but... No, it'll have to wait, Flock of Seagulls is on.

Vice City was perfection. They took what made GTA III so outstanding and replaced the grey exterior with a rainbow sheen. There was colour and flavour and references in everything. It was as much a piece on the 80s as it was a game about running over old people and hoovering up their cash. It's the videogame world's Scarface (if Scarface the game didn't exist). My second favourite GTA...

Cloud of Smoke

It's 2004 and I'm stood behind the counter of HMV watching people queue up with copies of San Andreas. My copy is safely tucked away beneath the till ready to pick up after work. I'm jealous as all Hell of everyone. This is the first time I've been able to afford to pick up a GTA on release day, and I have to spend 7 hours giving GTA to other people before I get to play it. I don't think I've ever got home so fast after a day of work.

Just to set the record straight from the off, San Andreas is my favourite of all the Grand Theft Auto games and I could never quite put my finger on why. It didn't innovate like GTA III did. It wasn't as freeform and silly as the original GTA games. It had a great aesthetic, but it wasn't as grand as the cheesy 80's cool of Vice City... But San Andreas, for me, felt like all the previous games wrapped up and spread thickly. It's one of the only games I've played where they managed to pile on so much stuff and none of it felt like filler (even when it was). Everything felt relevant to the character you were playing. Buying clothes. Going to the Gym. Eating food. None of that stuff was fun but you did it anyway because that's what CJ, your CJ needed to do in this world. Everything in that game felt organic, in both evolution and execution.

I can't even pinpoint how many times I took a BMX to the top of Mount Chilliad, stunt off the top and parachute to safety. And then do it again. And again. And again. This was before the days of achievements, there was no gain from doing so, but you just did it. You knew you'd be able to do it before you even got there. It was just something you had to do, and damn was it fun.

This game was huge, beyond words. I remember managing to steal a Jet and I flew across the borderlines to see what was across the shores. I ended up in the north eastern part of the map, with an instant 5 star warrant on my head. I excitedly explored as much as I could before I was shot down by the place. There's a Casino! Check out that hill, that'll be awesome to bike down! Oh wow, a desert... Is that a secret military base down there?! BOOM!

That sense of wonder, and excitement and just damn well breaking the rules all rolled up into one. I haven't felt that for a long, long time...

cloud of smoke

It's now 2008. Grand Theft Auto IV is here and I'm super excited. This time I'm playing on the 360 and I'm eager as all Hell to see what they've done with the next generation of GTA... I start off enjoying the game. I get asked to go Bowling and agree. I cruise around and do a few missions, and then I start rejecting offers of Bowling. I'm in the middle of a shoot-out with the cops and I'm getting invited to go Bowling. I try a spot of Helicopter theft and I'm asked to go Bowling. BOWLING. BOWLING. BOWLING. Grand Theft Auto IV bored me to tears. I made it to the second island and never went back. For the first time in a long time, I hadn't completed a Grand Theft Auto. The world had returned to a greyish husk. The main character and the rest of the cast were po-faced and bowling obsessed. Driving felt heavy instead of fast and loose. Gunplay hadn't really been improved. The world was smaller. My disappointment was only softened by the reintroduction of multiplayer. I played more online races on Grand Theft Auto IV than I did exploring its cast-over world, and I loved it... But that wasn't what GTA was about for me.

Skip to the present day. I've tried to keep all aspects of the newest Grand Theft Auto completely under wraps. I knew they'd returned to the wonderful world of Los Santos. I knew about the three main protagonists, but that was about it. And I waited. And I waited. And I waited. And then I saw it.

A friend of mine was playing the PS4 version of the game with a wide grin on his face. He showed me the size of the world. He showed me the driving, the damage model of the cars, the police chases, the music, the excitement, the sheer wonder and exploration and... I fell in love. GTA V is the GTA I've been waiting 11 years to play.

My budget for gaming is about £15 a month (family to feed and the sole worker in a relatively low income). At that rate, it'll take me around 3 months to purchase. I'm so, so eager to play this game. It's rare I put a request in on GOG as I hate to directly ask but I hope my endless wall of text shows how much I want to play this game. Thanks again for reading. You can now rest your weary eyes.