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+====== Site ======
+===== Editorials =====
+==== Death of a Community? ====
+The release of the much awaited sequel (the cunningly title GTA2) is almost at hand. Sequels usually spell the end of the prequels play time, but then the fan support for GTA is unprecedented. What will happen in the weeks to come?
+Grand Theft Auto has had extreme longevity. I think it's fair to say it's unexpected too. Of course the game has great depth, but with only six levels it's not the longest game around. Like most people I had played it through within a couple of weeks and expected it to join a growing pile of untouched games on my shelf. Completely off-hand I though I may as well see what sort of website it had. I unwittingly stumbled across a community growing at a near exponential rate. It was incredible. I mean, how can a game so unbearable to play across the internet have such a vast online following?
+The answer is quite simple, GTA Cars. It's safe to say that if Jeff hadn't made his little program we wouldn't be hear now. This site alone carries almost two and a half THOUSAND user cars. As I said, this is unprecedented.
+Now DMA have finished making the sequel, we've all played the demo, and at time or writing, release is due in two days time. So what's going to happen to the infamous GTA community? I strongly doubt we will just disappear. Assuming the sequel is as editable as our beloved game there's no reason to doubt there will be a deluge of GTA2 sites popping up all over the place. There's already quite a few out there. So where do we go?
+There are a few obvious ways the community can go. We can grow with the game, taking the GTA2 sites and newbies and incorporating them into the heart of our scene. This will mean that a lot of big sites will need a reshuffle or risk becoming obsolete. At present my site carries nothing for GTA2. I hope I'll be able to carry as many GTA2 cars as I do GTA ones and keep some sort of status among the burgeoning community. Only time will tell.
+On the other hand, the community could split quite violently. If GTA2 doesn't come with an editor and one isn't created for a couple of months then we'll have to tolerate the "I just scanned my manual and put it on the web" type sites, and there will be hundreds of them, trust me. I can see a lot of snobbery appearing between the present sites wanting nothing to do with these uninformative sites that bring nothing new and the new site owners who think GTA has had its shot.
+The final option is something I quite honestly dread, that is, the collapse of the GTA scene. Already a few webmasters have closed their GTA sites in favour of GTA2 sites. If more sites go this way and the core disappears from our community then the rest will have no choice but to abandon ship or go down with it. The GTA scene has kept us all together for almost two years now and personally I'll see it as a great shame if it dissipates.
+As for this site, well I plan to continue supporting GTA as long as there is a demand for it. If people stop sending me cars I'll have no choice but to drop it. I don't see that happening until there's a GTA2 editor out though, and even then there are some sticklers who will stay with GTA. I plan to make cars for both for a while at least.
+With a bit of luck we'll be able to coexist in much the same way as the Carmageddon scene (it's a lot smaller but similar principle). I'm not looking forward to GTA2 as much as I should be, but that was because I found the demo a disappointment. But I know it already has a growing fan base of people running around like headless chickens waiting for the imminent release. I really do hope it's a great as the first one and just as flexible to edit. Fingers crossed it won't spell the end of our beloved community.