When designing the game world, the team initially created a "hybrid city", which producer Dan Houser describes as "a post industrial Midwest slash east coast generic" city. Upon developing within this game world, the team realised that basing the design on a real location meant "you have a lot of things you can say about it". As a result, the team redesigned Liberty City, which had been previously featured in "Grand Theft Auto" (1997), basing it loosely on New York City. The city is broken into three islands: an industrial section representing Brooklyn and Queens, a commercial centre resembling Manhattan, and suburbs similar to New Jersey. The islands unlock as the story progresses; the team wanted players to "start out feeling poor and work to being richer". Dan Houser describes Liberty City as a "hybrid of a generic American city", including Chicago, Pittsburgh, Detroit, New York, and Philadelphia. He felt that the parallel realism of the world allowed the team to make more social commentary than previously. Sam Houser cited films and shows like "Heat" (1995) and "The Sopranos" (1999–2007) as inspiration for the setting, and wanted to emulate them in the game. He also cited the influence of "The Legend of Zelda", "Super Mario 64" and the film "Goodfellas" (1990), describing "Grand Theft Auto III" as "a cross between a gangster movie and an RPG".