Talking to someone who doesn’t really play or know much about video games can sometimes be a process, and a little difficult, but one game that almost all gamers, and non-gamers know about is Grand Theft Auto.

Grand Theft Auto has been a beloved fan favorite since the first Grand Theft Auto made its debut in 1997. Rockstar gave gamers a world that took them to a place that was different, and exciting. A world filled with crime, betrayal, and the opportunity to get creative when it came to heists or stealing rare cars. Grand Theft Auto is not just another game to play. It’s become an experience. Giving players everything from great locations, interesting characters, to even bright, and colorful clothing.

Of course, when you talk about a game like Grand Theft Auto, you can’t talk about it without hearing some of the controversy behind it. Whether it is stealing, the brutality, or even some of the inappropriate actions you could participate in within the game, Grand Theft Auto always draws attention to itself. One of the things that’s overlooked about Grand Theft Auto is the characters. Grand Theft Auto has some of the best characters in the gaming world. From Tommy Vercetti, to Michael De Santa, and Franklin Clinton — GTA's cast speaks volumes about its world.

You can’t deny when it comes to Grand Theft Auto quality is something that is almost always delivered, and every fan has a favorite. So, whether you’re a fan of the first Grand Theft Auto, Grand Theft Auto IV, or V. Here are 20 crazy things you didn’t know happened between GTA IV and GTA V

20 Sammy AKA Sonny Bottino

Even though Sonny didn’t make a physical cameo in Grand Theft Auto V. He was referenced on more than one occasion. A random event mission called “Burial” in Grand Theft Auto V, has you rescue Sonny Bottino’s daughter.

Wait Sonny had a daughter?

You could do this with any of the three characters. Once you rescue Sonny’s daughter, you bring her back to his house in Vinewood. While on the drive back she gives you a little insight into Sonny’s life. He ran the East coast during the 80s and 90s, but unfortunately got pinned for a crime during his in time in Vice City, and had to go into hiding on the West Coast. Talk about having bad luck, but we're glad to see Sonny is still alive and kicking.

19 Michael De Santa Inspired By Max Payne

Max Payne is game created by Remedy Entertainment, and produced by Rockstar Games. If you take a look at some of the details about Michael you can see the similarities between him, and the dark character that is Max Payne. Michaels grey suit that he wears is the same one that Max was sporting in the beginning of Max Payne 3. Remember Max’s special ability called Bullet Time? Allowing him to slow down time in any setting. Michael has the same exact ability.

Michael is also a depressed man in his 40s with a dark past, and a drinking problem. When you get to a certain part in GTA V, you find Michaels family being held hostage by a group of mercenaries. Just as you did in Max Payne when Max arrived home to find that his family was being held hostage.

18 Lola Del Rio

Lola Del Rio is the GTA IV model. She gained fame for her looks, and for the original release of the box cover art that she had six fingers on her right hand. That was just a painting error, that was corrected in later versions of the game. Lola is a NPC, but there were claims that she could be sighted throughout the game. On Liberty City Crime Tree its said could be sighted around Star Junction wandering around with her famous red lollipop. Lola doesn’t actually exist within the game, and it’s not actually possible to see her, but it became a popular myth. This myth created competitions for players to possibly win cash money if they were able to find Lola, and since she doesn’t exist this hasn’t been done.

17 GTA IV’s Script Beats Out Harry Potter

When it comes to game scripts they’re lengthy, but some of these scripts are much longer than your average book or movie. GTA IV is one of those games. The game had 80,000 lines of dialogue, and that was after the script was edited and refined. Now the GTA IV complete edition has 200,000 words.

This beat the famous Harry Potter and The Sorcerers Stone by J.K Rowling which, only had over 76,000 words.

Yes, a game beat a beloved book turned full-fledged movie series. Just goes to show that GTA IV is another gem that Rockstar has created, and they’ve continued to grow from there making every GTA game longer than the last. Obviously, this is an impressive achievement that would surprise most fans of both franchises.

16 Lamar Was Almost A Playable Character

Remember Lamar? Franklin’s crazy, and outgoing friend that got you into a few not so great situations? Well, he was almost a playable character. When you get to the final mission of GTA 5. Franklin has to make a choice of either killing Michael, or Trevor. There was also the option of leaving them both alive to get more of a “happier ending.”

After some players did a little digging around they found in the code that one of the original options would have been for Franklin to be killed, and Lamar would take his place.

“Wait what?”

Could you imagine Franklin saying good-bye, and Lamar taking over? That’s hard to swallow, now that GTA V has been out for 5 years, but would have been cool to see actually played out.

15 Shelby Welinder Is The GTA V Model

There was some buzz surrounding the GTA V model at first it was speculated to be Kate Upton. Then, Lindsay Lohan went further and formed a lawsuit against Rockstar Games. The actresses allegedly said that Rockstar used her likeness to create the model that you see on the loading screen.

Lohan wasn’t able to prove this factor, and did not win that lawsuit. It was later revealed the actual person that inspired the GTA V bikini model is in fact Shelby Welinder, who was hired by Rockstar Games through the modeling agency whom she worked for back in 2012. Unfortunately not all press is good press, and after it was revealed that Shelby Welinder was the GTA V model, she received a lot of negative feedback, but she didn’t let that get her down.

14 What Happened To Niko Bellic?

Lester in GTA 5 does mention a certain Eastern European that shook and took Liberty City by storm. Lester doesn’t go into detail about Niko’s whereabouts, but he does mention that Niko has gone dark, and no one knows where he is, ultimately assuming that Niko is dead. Patrick McReary is a friend of Niko’s, and if you run into him during the game. He tells you that he believes Niko is dead. So, no one is really sure what happened to Niko.

One thing that proves Niko is still alive is his LifeInvader page in GTA 5.

It shows that he is living his best life. At least we know that our beloved Niko is alive and well, living out the rest of his life still in Liberty City along with his cousin Roman who is still obsessed with bowling.

13 Crossing Dressing Mission Cut From GTA V

Left behind in GTA V’s gaming code was a mission that was sadly cut from the game. The mission was called The Sharmoota Job. Trevor and Michael would have to pretend to be a couple, being shown around the city, and later end up robbing one of the mansions in an upscale neighborhood that they visit.

One of the parts of this mission would be Trevor dressing up, and playing a woman. Rockstar didn’t say why they cut that particular mission, and we can only guess that maybe one of the reasons was to not offend anyone. Although seeing Trevor, and Michael pretend to be a couple, and seeing Trevor dress up as a woman trying to be “feminine” would have been something to see, and a lot of gamers would agree.

12 Niko Bellic Was Based Off Vladimir Mashkov

Does the well-known character Niko Bellic remind you of someone? Possibly a character that you’ve seen in a well known movie? Have you ever seen Behind Enemy Lines? Well if you have then you know about the character Sasha played by Vladimir Mashkov.

When Grand Theft Auto IV went into production Rockstar asked if Mashkov wanted to Voice Bellic’s character. Unfortunately, he turned it down, because Mashkov didn’t take the role seriously at the time. It would have been interesting to see how the game would’ve turned out if Mashkov decided to take on the role of Bellick, but since Mashkov didn’t take the role. It was offered, and taken by Michael Hollick instead, who did a great a job.

11 GTA V Did What GTA: San Andreas Couldn’t

When Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was in development Rockstar wanted to allow players to take on several different roles. Unfortunately given the technology at the time, and because of technical difficulties, Rockstar wasn’t able to accomplish this. Fast-forward 8 years later. Rockstar made their dreams into a reality, and created the masterpiece that is Grand Theft Auto V.

As awesome as if would have been to see GTA: San Andreas with the option of playing multiple characters in one game, we get that it wasn’t possible. What would be really neat is if Rockstar decided to do a remake. Doing what they originally wanted with San Andreas. It’s reaching a little bit, and it's not impossible, but one can dream can’t they?

10 GTA V Cost More to Make Than The First Avengers Movie

With the visuals, the great voice acting, character development, and open-world. We can speculate that GTA V cost a lot to make, but how much did it cost exactly? Well, GTA V cost $265 million to make, and market. (Whoa!) That’s a ton of money for just one game.

For example, Uncharted 3 only cost about $25 million, and Gears of War cost $10 million. Those are small game budgets when you compare.

GTA V cost more than the first Avengers movie, which only cost $220 million to make. Imagine if all games had that large budget. The quality would be top notch. Rockstar definitely had a, “Go big or go home” attitude when they made GTA V, and we definitely thank them for it.

9 Casting The Team Is Unreal

Grand Theft Auto games are known to have a ton of dialogue, and a lot of that gets scrapped once the game goes into development. Rockstar North’s Alastair MacGregor, revealed that GTA V was just shy 160,000 lines of dialogue. Wow.

Once GTA V put the final touches on the script the end result was just over 158,000 lines.

Could you imagine all of that being fit into one game? When you play through any GTA title you'll definitely notice the large amount of dialogue just by random characters walking near you on the street. That is still a lot of dialogue when you think about it. Every year Rockstar manages to surpass themselves making a game that has even more dialogue than the last installment. They really know how to outdo themselves.

8 Viv Voiced Aunt Denise

Denise is Franklins Sassy strong Aunt that doesn’t put up with any of his crap in GTA V. She keeps him in check, and make sure he doesn’t put a damper of her living her best life. Does that sound familiar? If you watched Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air you probably recognize the well-known voice. That’s right Aunt Denise is voiced by Janet Hubert.

Although Aunt Denise isn’t as loving, uplifting, and concerned her about her nephews life as Aunt Viv was. Calling herself a “new age feminist” She holds frequent meetings in her home and is all about female empowerment. Although it would’ve been great to see her, and Franklin have a fun loving relationship as Will, and Aunt Viv. We get what Rockstar was going for, and they picked a great actress to do it.

7 Rockstar Got Rid Of “Fantasy Vehicles” In GTA IV

Rockstar wanted a real-life experience with GTA IV, so they cut out “fantasy vehicles” that meant no jetpacks, invincible cars, and tanks. Just like Rockstar got rid of the ability to fly planes, they ditched all of these features. Of course, there were a lot of players that didn’t truly understand the reason. It’s hard to imagine having a Grand Theft Auto game without a tank, a jetpack, and a few other items that make GTA what it is. Rockstar wanted to give Liberty city a more natural look, and feel of the city that it was based on. You don’t see someone flying through New York City with a jetpack right? At least for now anyway. It’s understandable what they were going for when they developed GTA IV, and the game still came out great.

6 Kanye West

Kanye West is a well-known rap artist, business man, and fashion designer. There are few people who don’t know who Kanye West is. It's worth noting that there is a non-playable character in GTA V that looks a lot like Kanye West, and If you were lucky enough you might’ve run into the Kayne West doppelganger. Rockstar never did confirm whether it was Kayne West or not, but you can’t deny that it looks exactly like him. Don’t think you can just go, and hunt for him though. This Kanye West Doppelganger is almost impossible to find. You just run into him randomly throughout different parts in the game. There is only one way to spot him, and that’s by being very lucky. Otherwise, just enjoy the picture some lucky player snapped of him in the game.

5 Rockstar Prevented Flying Airplanes In GTA IV

It was speculated that the reason for this was because GTA IV takes place in Liberty City. If you played GTA IV you know that it’s an in-game version of a real-life New York City. The rumors circulated that planes were taken out of the game, because they didn’t want any players to reenact 9/11, but that rumor was debunked after Dan Houser. One of the Co-Founders of Rockstar games. Stated, “There are no planes because it’s just one city.” Houser goes on to say, “Apart from the fact that there are vehicles…wherever you are, its still realistic.” That seems much more accurate, and glad that isn’t the reason, but there are some who still stand by their theories. Hey, no shame there right?

4 Perfect Score

Grand Theft Auto V caught some controversy (like other GTA title), but that doesn’t stop the franchise from gaining rave reviews by the top game reviewers, and magazines. Needless to say, this is a tough thing to accomplish. One publication in particular stood out for giving the game a great review. Japanese magazine Famitsu is a tough critic of the worlds best games — they don't give out scores so easily. However, Famitsu Magazine gave GTA V a perfect score. The only other Western game to achieve this at the time was Skyrim. GTA IV was also very close to receiving a perfect score, but in the end missed out by 1 point, giving the game a 39/40. If only it received that 40 score, that would have put 2 GTA titles with a perfect score in Famitsu magazine.

3 Real Gangsters

We know that Rockstar has hired some amazing voice actors to play characters that gamers have grown to adore. They go above and beyond to deliver great quality. One of those above and beyond moments was hiring real gangsters to voice the different gang members that you encounter throughout GTA V.

Rockstar wanted to give authenticity to its player when it came to this aspect of the game. Some of the gangsters even added pieces of their own dialogue. Making it that much more authentic. Rockstar seriously pulls out all the stops. Real gangsters to voice actual in game gangsters? Not sure if there is any other game that would to go that far to bring in that great quality, that gamers know, and love.

2 EMP Drop?

Grand Theft Auto has always had some gems, and secrets, that players stumble across later on. GTA V players have come across a secret phone number. Calling the number at 1-999-367-3767 connects you to something called “Black Cellphones.” Not sure why this is, but it triggers an explosion in the sky. Unfortunately, this doesn’t fry all of the electronics within the area, but after the explosion happens it changes the look of your cell phone. You never know with Rockstar or why they would include this in-game feature, but RockStar really doesn’t need much reason for doing the outrageous things that they do.

Whether your looking to cause some chaos, or looking to change your cell phone theme, you could give this a try, either way, it doesn’t disappoint.

1 Creepy Yoga

Michaels wife Amanda De Santa definitely uses her love for yoga as a way to release stress from her extreme husband. After you play through the mission “Did Someone Say Yoga?” You could unlock the ability to do yoga yourself. In an updated version of the Los Santos Travelogue some of those poses looked rather inappropriate, and that yoga teacher Fabien LaRouche definitely raised some questions, and eyebrows when he was demonstrating some of those yoga positions with Michaels wife. Something about their behavior definitely gave the impression that there was more going on than just yoga. As well as, some of these questionable yoga positions which included, “Downward Facing Camel,” and “Punching Starfish” Yes these yoga positions are real, but knowing Rockstar. They definitely put their own spin on this. Of course, this is one of just many mini-games that made the cut.