GTA Chinatown Wars: how to play it today, from Nintendo DS to your phone

GTA Chinatown Wars (CTW) is a game by Rockstar Leeds and Rockstar North, originally made for Nintendo DS. It's set in the present-day Liberty City of the GTA IV era, minus Alderney. The protagonist is Huang Lee, the spoiled son of a triad leader. After his father's murder he has to deliver an ancient sword to his uncle Kenny so the family keeps control of the triads. The moment Huang lands, he's robbed and left for dead, and the hunt for a traitor inside his own gang begins.

The camera looks down on the city at an angle and rotates, recalling the first GTA and GTA 2, but everything is in 3D. On DS the graphics have a comic-book look with black outlines (cel-shading), and cutscenes are drawn as comic panels. The touchscreen handles minigames: turning a screwdriver in the ignition, connecting wires, typing a code on a keypad.

A few more differences from other GTA games: to lose your wanted level you have to destroy police cars (one per star), there are security cameras instead of hidden packages, and weapons are ordered through the in-game Ammu-Nation website. What made the most noise was black-market trading: buy cheap in one district, sell high in another. That mechanic made the game controversial, though critics praised it highly.

The mobile versions are based on the PSP one: they have the same music from DS and PSP, and on iOS you could build your own playlist from your music library. The mobile versions have no multiplayer or Social Club support. On October 13, 2013, Rockstar pulled the game from the App Store without explanation over iOS 7 compatibility issues and brought it back on December 21, 2013.

Today the only way to buy Chinatown Wars legally is for a phone or tablet. The model is the same as Liberty City Stories: on the App Store and Google Play the game is a free download, you can play it for up to 30 minutes (one trial per user), and then you buy the full game with a one-time in-app purchase. The stores don't show that purchase price on the game page; you see it in the game itself.

Data as of October 31, 2026. The developer listed in the store is Rockstar Games; "cheat apps" and APKs from unofficial sites have nothing to do with Rockstar and can be dangerous.

On October 19, 2023, Rockstar added Chinatown Wars and Liberty City Stories to the game library of its GTA+ subscription. Members play the full mobile version on iOS and Android by signing in with the Rockstar Games account linked to the subscription (which you can take out on PlayStation, Xbox or PC). Chinatown Wars doesn't run through GTA+ on consoles. The GTA+ library changes over time, so check the current list on Rockstar's GTA+ page before subscribing; as of October 31, 2026, we couldn't confirm the game is still in it.

No. Rockstar never released Chinatown Wars on PC, so it isn't on Steam or Rockstar Games Launcher, and there are no official PC system requirements. It never came out on PS4, PS5, Xbox or Nintendo Switch either, and Rockstar hasn't announced any re-release. On Nintendo 3DS you can play the original DS cartridge, since the 3DS runs DS games, but there's no separate 3DS version.

According to the App Store, the mobile version is available in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Japanese.

On DS and PSP, cheats are entered as button combos during play: for example, health and armor is L L R A A B B R on DS and L L R ○ ○ ✕ ✕ R on PSP. On iOS and Android you spell codes with letters on the whiteboard in any safehouse: LIFEUP for health and armor, CASHIN for $10,000. There's no separate money cheat on DS and PSP. Any cheat disables autosave, so save manually first. The full table is on the GTA Chinatown Wars cheats page.