I played GTA, and is true crime a better game? No but if your stuck with a gamecube this is the game for you.
It has some replayabilty, and the character building (althought= there is only one character) does add an element to this games that GTA does not have.
They could afford to lose the "stealth mode", but the controls were progressive and easy to learn.
The only thing is that like all video games the movie clips are chessy, this game should have taken a page out of Bad Boys.