Exclusive Interview: Nick Castellano, Creator of the Documentary ‘The History of Grand Theft Auto (1984-2021)’

I was first introduced to GTA III at a friend’s house party in December, 2001, and for two decades it has been my favorite video game franchise. The words Grand Theft Auto aren’t only synonymous in the gaming industry. They have become an irreplaceable staple in our culture.

YouTube Content Creator Nick Castellano released an independent documentary titled “The History of Grand Theft Auto (1984-2021)” and I was compelled to watch. The production chronicles the timeline of the franchise from its earliest days through the present, and includes every stop along the way.

Other than the flawless trip down memory lane, I loved the passion with which Nick demonstrates. He shares the same affinity for the series as many of us do, and presents a narrative that includes each stage of the game with the always changing technology, controversies, and social issues that has made every release that much better than the one before, helping to propel it further into mythical lore.

If you love GTA you’ll love this documentary. It gets an A+ from me. You can watch here.

We had the chance to chat with Nick about “The History of Grand Theft Auto” as well as some of his other projects!

1 – Can you introduce yourself for our readers?

Sure thing! I’m Nick Castellano, I’m a 29 year old content creator on YouTube with a heavy emphasis on creating detailed reviews, graphical analyses, and video documentaries about the video game industry.

2 – How long have you been a content creator?

I’ve been creating video content for as long as I can remember. I started off making skate videos in my driveway with my parents’ digital camera in 2005, and eventually turned to making smaller cinematic pieces within video games like UbiSoft’s “Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory” and DICE’s “Battlefield 2.” I made several of these videos and had to upload them to websites like Filefront to share them since YouTube really wasn’t that big yet.

3 – Is The History of GTA your first full length production?

The History of GTA is certainly the largest project I’ve ever worked on, running in at 2 hours and 17 minutes. But I wouldn’t say it was the first full length production I’ve put together. One of the first videos I uploaded to YouTube was a trailer for a Battlefield 2 cinematic film I created, that was split up into 3 parts called “The Battle of Oman.”

It was inspired by the cinematic pieces that The Sir Community had put together around that time, who were kind enough to let me borrow their private game server to host the 63 actors I recruited to record the scenes. In hindsight – the production was a disaster. Trying to keep 63 other players from blowing each other up while I instructed each of them what to do for a big battle was a lot harder than I thought it would be. But in the end, I managed to get the shots I needed and was happy with the results at the time.

Fast forward about a decade and I’ve redirected my focus into reviews and documentary work – covering some of my favorite game franchises with a detailed breakdown of their developmental history, gameplay evolution, and graphical analysis. I’ve created several of these videos, that were initially only about 15-30minutes long. But I’ve since been covering more ambitious topics that require a lot more time and effort. My previous documentary on the game series “Mafia” for example – was an hour long and was the first project where I managed to secure an exclusive interview with Jarek Kolar – who was the senior gameplay producer for Mafia 2 and served a major role in the development of Mafia 3.

4 – What prompted you to make The History of GTA? What were your inspirations?

I’ve covered a lot of big game franchises that I have always been intrigued by. And Grand Theft Auto was a project I had long wanted to cover, but just needed enough time to do it properly. And because I had to talk about Grand Theft Auto when putting together my documentary on Mafia earlier this year, I decided it was time to finally dive headfirst into the worlds of GTA.

5 – How long did it take you to complete the project?

Work for this project began almost immediately after I finished production for the Mafia documentary (late March). The first step was making sure I had all the games working properly with the cleanest possible visual presentation – which sometimes can be incredibly challenging with older games on modern hardware. GTA1 for example, refused to even start at first, and I even reached out to John Linneman from Digital Foundry for some recommendations, which he was happy to assist with. Once all the games were working properly, I then had to spend the next two weeks playing through them all, recording the main storyline and any extraneous details I wanted to discuss. I then spent another 2 weeks writing the script, about 3 days recording the voice-over, and then roughly 2 more weeks of straight editing, sometimes going from 8am one day to 3am the next.

To give you a rough idea of how long the whole process took, I managed to watch all 19 seasons of “Family Guy” on Hulu during production.

6 – Do you have any future projects you are working on?

Following any documentary on my channel, I like to take it easy for a couple weeks and turn to my “Direct Comparison” video series, where I look at new releases of video games and see what they’ve done to differentiate themselves from their predecessors or the competition.

As for my documentary series, my next big project will cover the “History of Metal Gear.” I’m already doing some preliminary research and ensuring each game in my library is working properly and am aiming for a June release. After this, I have plans to cover the History of Halo – likely releasing around 343’s upcoming “Halo Infinite,” and the project I’m most excited for – the “History of Battlefield,” where I’ll be returning to the one that pretty much started my YouTube career in the first place. Then of course I have a few other surprises planned for this year as well.

7 – You must love GTA – what are your first and/or favorite memories of the game?

GTA is such an incredible series, but one that for the longest time, was essentially off limits to me. I was born in 1991, so by the time Grand Theft Auto had really started to get popular, I still wasn’t old enough to play it. And all the negative press surrounding the game, trying to villainize it certainly didn’t help. My mother was pretty good about making sure I only played games appropriate for my age, but her jurisdiction didn’t apply when I went over to my friend’s house.

We’d watch R-rated movies (Alien, the Shining), skateboard in the unfinished section of his basement on dangerous ramps, and of course – caused total chaos on the streets of liberty city in GTA3. I distinctly remember spawning in tanks at the intersection near the broken bridge and attempting to jump the gap into the 2^nd city by firing the turret backwards like some sort of rocket boost. It of course never worked – but back then we were naïve enough to think it would.

After that, I didn’t really get back into Grand Theft Auto until I purchased GTAIV years later. I’ve loved the series’ satirical nature and incredible open worlds ever since and regularly hop on GTA Online to play cooperative missions with my friends. As far as a favorite memory – I don’t think I’ve ever felt the same feeling of accomplishment than when our group finally managed to earn the coveted “Criminal Mastermind” bonus, which involves completing each heist in order without any teammate dying. I remember my hands shaking while we parachuted down Raton canyon towards the final escape boat, and earning that 10million dollar in-game reward (which back then, seemed like a lot in the world of GTA Online) made the months of failed attempts all seem worth it.

8 – Thoughts/Hopes/Predictions for GTA 6?

I spent a lot of time thinking about where Rockstar might take the series with GTA6. It’s tough to say for sure. The most obvious choice would be a return to Vice City, with a larger recreation of Miami and perhaps the surrounding area. If they do go down this route – I’d love for them to stick to a modern setting, rather than trying to retell the same 1980s story they told before. I’d also love to see lots of variety in the map itself. Give us a big, parodied version of Miami – sure. But why stop there? How about a parody of Orlando, with an exaggerated version of the theme parks to explore? They could also throw in regions on the west coast like Fort Myers and Tampa, let us ride horses in the farmlands around Ocala, and of course all the popular vacation spots along the southeastern side like Jupiter, West Palm Beach, and the Florida Keys. If they want their new game to stand a chance against the incredible world created in GTAV – they’re going to need to expand significantly.

But if they choose to be more creative with it and avoid Florida altogether, I think it might be time to branch out of the United States and parody something else. Modern day Japan could be a cool new setting, with the neon lit skyline of Tokyo juxtaposed to the forests and mountainsides of Hokkaido. Or perhaps even a return to the UK – where there’s no doubt plenty of things to make social commentary about, like Brexit for example.

All we know for sure is that longtime lead writer Dan Houser, and executive producer Leslie Benzies won’t be involved this time. And while this doesn’t necessarily spell doom for the future of the series, it most definitely will require some adjustment on Rockstar North’s part. We also must consider the success of GTA Online. It’s hugely popular – and isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Whatever GTA6 is – you better believe GTA Online will be connected to it in some way. Based on the pattern of game releases and development out of Rockstar – my prediction is that we’ll get some sort of teaser this year, a full trailer in 2022, and a final release in early 2023.

9 – Where can people follow you on social media? 

All of my latest videos will be posted on YouTube on my channel (www.youtube.com/nick930). I’m also on both twitter (@nick930gaming) and Facebook (facebook.com/nick930gaming), where I share new uploads and regular updates on projects I’m working on. I also occasionally livestream on Twitch (twitch.tv/nick930), sometimes while I’m recording content for my documentaries. And for supporters that just can’t wait for my new documentaries – I also have a Patreon, where subscribers can unlock early access to new projects, among other benefits like private discord access and shout outs.  (https://www.patreon.com/Nick930)