Grand Theft Auto III, Vice City and San Andreas were released as PS2 exclusives, and the deals to keep them exclusive to the console were partly due to Sony's concerns about the Xbox at the time.

In a special session at London's European Games Show hosted by GamesIndustry's Christopher Dearing, Chris Dearing, who was president of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe until the PS3 launched, talked about the many deals that made some third-party games exclusive to the PlayStation. He said that some of these deals, such as the one for Grand Theft Auto, were made in part to counter the Xbox. Sony was concerned when it saw the Xbox coming, and they knew exclusivity was important in other areas, so when the original Xbox was about to launch, they talked to some of their favorite third-party developers and publishers and asked them if they would be willing to sign a special deal to make their next-generation games exclusive to the PlayStation for two years. Take Two was one of the publishers that accepted this proposal, and this move achieved results far beyond expectations, because at that time "GTA" was not as popular as it is today, and its early top-down version did not cause a great sensation around the world.

In addition to discussing the Grand Theft Auto exclusivity deal, other former Sony executives commented on a number of other interesting facts about the PlayStation's 30-year history, such as the industry press's skepticism of the PS2, the well-publicized PS3 development issues, and the London studio's complaints about the PS4's lack of a built-in camera.