The Liberty Tree is a newspaper that serves Liberty City in various Grand Theft Auto games. The Liberty Tree has been "Promoting Family values for over 50 years". Each issue costs $2.00 in GTA III , and $1.00 in GTA IV.
Events
GTA Liberty City Stories
The map that accompanied the game had a map provided by the newspaper. Liberty Tree was featured prominently in Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories through Ned Burner, who pretends to be a preacher. He gives missions to protagonist Toni Cipriani from a confessional box in the Liberty City Cathedral saying that they will help save him. The first mission is to retrieve a briefcase from an FBI informant before he hands it to the FBI, and then delivering it to the Liberty Tree offices. Cipriani then steals another briefcase containing diamonds, and then creates chaos on Staunton Island whilst driving a Firetruck. The final mission for Burner was killing three celebrities (Faith W., DB-P and Black Lightman) on their way to an interview with Liberty City Free Radio. Burner would report on each story: the first about an athlete on steroids, the stealing of diamonds, chaos on Staunton Island and the death of three celebrities. Burner would eventually be killed by Cipriani on orders from Donald Love as Burner witnessed the killing of Avery Carrington. The user guide for GTA LCS is in the form of a copy of the Liberty Tree.
GTA III
Liberty Tree was first featured in Grand Theft Auto III, copies of the paper featuring Claude with a different skin featuring the now famous headline Zombie Elvis Found! can be seen amongst debris particles that are blown around by the wind in the game. A Liberty Tree website was used as a teaser site. Articles appeared on the characters such as Salvatore Leone, Toni Cipriani, Joey Leone, Luigi Goterelli, Donald Love, Barry Harcross and Mayor Miles O’Donovan.
GTA IV
According to the GTA IV documentary, A History of Liberty City, the first Liberty Tree newspaper came out in 1835, however, citizens complained about this as they wanted less political news and more dirty news, like murder and rape.
In Grand Theft Auto IV, the Liberty Tree can be read on the in-game internet on the Liberty Tree website. It shows the happenings of the city, along with Niko's exploits. The Liberty Tree name is found on some Steed trucks. A Liberty Tree newspaper can be seen in certain interiors, with Manny Escuela on the front page.
GTA V
Articles from the Liberty Tree newspaper can be read in the in-game internet after some of the missions are completed, one of then even mention a storm that hit and devastated Liberty City. Others, mention some of the events of the storyline, like the "disappearance" of Devin Weston.
News reporters/Journalists
3D Universe
- Adam Tedman
- Amy Salzburg
- Andre Perkins
- Anul Garbaskar
- Benjamin Mill
- Beverly Clamhopper
- Bill Tautz
- Bob Jefferson
- Bob Malkin
- Brian Robinson
- Chris Carruthers
- Clint Glen
- E. Crume
- Frederic Pierce
- Frenchie Cockmaven
- Gaylord Morrisen
- Gregory Lau
- Howard Child
- Irene Kelly
- Jayne Kwiatowski
- Jeffrey Veselik
- Joel Stahlman
- Johnnie Blain
- Johnny Ryan
- Julius Cohen
- Kelly Sue DeConnick
- Ken Dellamonica
- Kristen Burns
- Louie Schaffer
- Mark Reed
- Morgan Merryweather
- Ned Burner (Deceased)
- Nicholas Morris
- Paul Civille
- Paul Marchiando
- Paul Mill
- Peter Armstrong
- Stan Wayridge
- Thomas Jones
- Thomas Shaw
- Thomas Stewart
- Trudy Fink
- Walt Jefferson
- Walt Karl
- William Mazyck
HD Universe
Newspaper sections
- Business
- Classifieds
- Column
- Comics
- Entertainment
- Employment
- Forum
- GORE
- Horoscope
- Hypocrisy
- Lifestyle
- Lottery
- Marketplace
- News
- Puzzles
- Real Estate
- Reviews
- Sports
- Traffic
- Travel
- TV Listings
Gallery
Trivia
- In GTA IV, the newspaper misspells Manny Escuela's name on the front page, spelling it as "Escuella". It also lists the date March 3, 2005 as a Tuesday, when in reality it was a Thursday, which is also somewhat erroneous, as GTA IV is set in 2008. However, as the bottom of the newspaper reads "Bronx Crime" (a real location as opposed to its Grand Theft Auto counterpart Bohan), it can be presumed that this was concept art early in development, which would explain the inaccuracies. Even more interestingly, New York City is mentioned in the articles, despite being set in the GTA equivalent of New York City.
- In GTA V, the article about the storm that hits and devastates Liberty City could be a reference to Hurricane Sandy that hit New York City that caused some devastating destruction to the city in 2012.