When it comes to the Grand Theft Auto series, everyone loves playable protagonists like Trevor for his unhinged craziness and CJ for being a softie at heart.
But GTA games are packed to the gills with great supporting characters who are lovable, despicable, flawed, and ridiculous – often all at once. Let’s take a look at some of the memorable personalities who helped make the games as terrific as they are.
Click through the slideshow above or scroll down the rest of the page to see the full list.
18. Phil Cassidy - GTA III, GTA: Vice City, GTA: Liberty City Stories, GTA: Vice City Stories
Arms dealer and boomshine entrepreneur Phil Cassidy has featured in a quartet of GTA games but it’s his Vice City appearances that are the most memorable, largely thanks to infamous Hollywood loose unit Gary Busey providing the VO. In a twist of fate, Phil’s punishment for providing arms to the scum of Vice City was to lose one of his own. His left one, that is, (although, in the cutscene, he actually blew off his right arm; let’s blame that one on too much boomshine, shall we?)
17. Auntie Poulet - GTA: Vice City
In a series filled with shady characters, Auntie Poulet is one of the shadiest. As the leader of the Haitian gang in Vice City, she runs her business without any apparent moral guidelines. Instead of hiring Tommy Vercetti in the traditional criminal manner, she feeds him voodoo potions that make him blindly agree to everything she asks him to do – which mostly consists of messing with the Cubans, a group Tommy had just been working with. But since she’s voiced by the charismatic Miss Cleo, a famous real-life telephone psychic, it’s hard to hold it against her.
16. Toni Cipriani - GTA III
Grand Theft Auto III broke new ground in terms of open-world gaming, but its script doesn’t devote much time to character development. Most cutscenes just explain your next mission and nothing more (it doesn’t help that protagonist Claude didn’t have any speaking lines). That said, Toni Cipriani is probably the most memorable character in the game (he even led his own prequel later on in 2005’s Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories). Voiced by Michael Madsen this mafioso works in his mother’s restaurant, where he endures her constant nagging. This weighs so heavily on Capriani that he calls into Chatterbox FM to complain about her on talk radio. Maybe he’s just mad she spelled his name with an “i” instead of a “y.”
15. Jimmy De Santa - GTA V
Michael’s son Jimmy is no role model but he’s still pretty hilarious in GTA V despite regularly being an awful, entitled brat.
A lazy, pot-smoking gamer with daddy issues (like many characters in the series, come to think of it), Jimmy actually does seem to try his best – even though that usually results in spectacular screw-ups that his dad has to rescue him from. But, with a career criminal like Michael for a father, can you really blame him?
14. Elizabeta Torres - GTA IV
If you want to make a professional-grade drug deal in Liberty City, Elizabeta Torres is your woman. Not only is she a well-connected dealer, but she has the distinction of being one of the less cartoonish characters in GTA IV. She’s a serious business woman who puts up with no nonsense from stoners like the Rastafarian Little Jacob when they cross paths. When she thinks the fuzz is onto her, however, her flaws start to show. She freaks out, does a bunch of blow, and starts shooting people. You know, as one does.
13. Brucie Kibbutz - GTA IV, GTA V, GTA Online
On the surface, Brucie is not a very likable guy. Every other word out of his mouth is “bro,” and to stay strong he injects bull shark testosterone before working out, which gives him a raging temper. But he somehow manages to be an endearing presence in GTA IV. He takes a lot of crap from his older brother, and can’t ever make things work out quite the way he wants them to. That’s why we can’t help but root for him.
12. Lazlow - Basically Every GTA Since GTA III
Lazlow is a background character in every GTA game since GTA III, hosting a large variety of radio shows across three decades and a variety of cities. However, his career – which began as a meek intern alongside Cousin Ed on V-Rock in ’80s Vice City – has just about petered out by the time we get to the events of GTA Online and GTA V (where we meet Lazlow in the flesh for the first time). These days Lazlow is a vain, whimpering D-lister clinging onto what’s left of his fame, but he’s just as funny.
11. Love Fist - GTA: Vice City, GTA V
Like the rest of Vice City, this hair metal band is straight out of the ’80s. Led by the irrepressible Jezz Torrent they’re a rambunctious bunch of “drunken Scottish bisexuals” who manage to be more absurd than Spinal Tap. They even have an album called “Fat Chicks All Day and Night,” for crying out loud. In your missions for them, you discover that they’re hopelessly addicted to the drug “love juice,” and they’re being stalked by a murderer. They also speak in accents so thick some may need subtitles to understand them – but, like all GTA games, the subtitles are written phonetically so you may not get much help there.
10. Ken Rosenberg - GTA: Vice City & GTA: San Andreas
Every respectable criminal needs a lawyer and Ken Rosenberg is one of the best. The thing is, he’s usually too busy complaining about his lot in life to be of much use in front of a judge. But, for all his kvetching, he stays loyal Tommy Vercetti and CJ – which is more than you can say for most of your friends in these games. And if Rosenberg’s cocaine habit is a personal failing, just know he wasn’t alone on that count. Hey, it was the '80s.
09. Lamar Davis - GTA V, GTA Online
Employee of the Month runner-up Lamar Davis is probably the funniest character in GTA V this side of the unhinged Trevor. Franklin’s foul-mouthed but faithful friend isn’t exactly the sharpest crayon in the box, however, and would’ve happily handed over a sports bag full of cash for what was actually a brick of drywall had Trevor not spotted the hustle.
08. Yusuf Amir - GTA IV
Yusuf Amir is a filthy-rich real estate developer who first appears in GTA IV. He loves to hang out in his luxurious penthouse suite and boast to anyone who will listen about his money, conquests, and desire to own all the property in Liberty City. He also collects gold plated items and claims that a billion dollars is nothing — all of which may or may not be a cover for some serious underlying daddy issues. Even in a series packed full of colorful characters, Yusuf Amir practically pops off the screen.
07. Phil Collins - Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories
Songs by Phil Collins have appeared in a handful of GTA games, but Phil himself features as a supporting character in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories. Stopping off in Vice City for an upcoming gig, Phil becomes the target of multiple assassination attempts over a bad debt his manager owes. The level where players must prevent Phil from being whacked during a live performance of ‘In the Air Tonight’ is one of the most memorable GTA missions ever.
06. Wade Herbert - GTA V
Possibly the dumbest character ever to grace the cast of a GTA game (and that’s saying something), Wade Herbert is so pathetic you can’t help but love him in GTA V.
He’s in the unfortunate position of being Trevor’s friend, which means he puts up with a lot of abuse and never gets the appreciation he deserves. In the end, Wade means well – but you’ll never hear Trevor admit it.
05. Kent Paul and Maccer - GTA: Vice City
Kent Paul turns up in Vice City as the manager of Love Fist, but he really comes into his own with his buddy (and compulsive masturbator) Maccer in GTA: San Andreas. These two idiots get blitzed on bad peyote and pass out in the desert. CJ drives them back to civilization, stopping along the way to let them vomit and urinate. It doesn’t get much better from there. Sure this duo is a mess, but they’re always good for a laugh.
04. Umberto Robina – GTA: Vice City, GTA: Vice City Stories
Chubby Cuban café owner Umberto Robina – worshipper of women, admirer of real men, and hater of all things Haitian – is a passionate man full of oddball advice (“How do you take out a snake? You bite him in the ass!”). Brought to life by the inimitable Danny Trejo, Umberto is always quick to proclaim he possesses “balls everywhere; balls to spare” but he’s also unafraid to express his emotions in front of his lackeys, bursting into hysterical tears when he feared his beloved Papi was going to killed by rival gangbangers.
03. Frank Tenpenny - GTA: San Andreas
Any character voiced by Samuel L. Jackson should be cool, but Frank Tenpenny is one of the most despicable villains in the whole series. This cop is as crooked as a corkscrew, robbing CJ and pinning the murder of a police officer on him the moment he arrives in San Andreas. Somehow his actions only get worse from there. But for all his faults, Tenpenny is the type of villain we love to hate, which makes his eventual downfall all the sweeter.
02. Tony Prince - GTA IV, GTA IV: TLatD, GTA IV: TBoGT, GTA Online
The man who ran the 1980s and was the 1990s, “Gay” Tony Prince is known primarily for his appearances during the GTA IV era, but he also recently reappeared in GTA Online as a key character in the nightclub-centric ‘After Hours’ update. It was great to have him back, at the very least to verbally destroy the timid and hopeless Lazlow. The largely likeable Gay Tony is probably one of the least outright awful human beings in the GTA universe.
01. Fernando Martinez - Almost Every GTA Since GTA III
Latin lothario Fernando Martinez has found a gig on the radio in nearly every Grand Theft Auto game since GTAIII; only Lazlow has shown up more often. A serial sex pest who became an American the “courageous way” (by “outrunning the speed boat”), Fernando’s third-person musings on the airwaves are typically as absurdly hilarious as they are madly mysoginistic. He may be plagued with personal, health, and legal problems these days, but Emotion 98.3 wouldn’t have been the same without him.
Who’d we miss? Let us know your favorite supporting GTA characters in the comments section. In the meantime, why not check out everything included in the new Diamond Casino update for GTA Online, or our thoughts on what GTA 6 can learn from Red Dead 2.
Luke is Games Editor at IGN AU. You can find him on IGN here or on Twitter @MrLukeReilly, or chat with him and the rest of the Australian team by joining the IGN Australia Facebook community.
Chris Reed is IGN's shopping and commerce editor. You can follow him on Twitter @_chrislreed.
