Raymond Alberga, did he even exist?

[universetwisters]

I'm pretty sure anyone who's read the GTAWiki page about beta stuff from IV knows of this mysterious figure Raymond Alberga, who was allegedly supposed to have been in GTA 4 but was cut before release, or was the beta name for Ray Boccino, something or the other.

Is there any truth to this claim or is it just a rumor that hasn't been disproven for over a decade? On one hand, I feel like it is. But on the other hand, there could be some magazine preview or some other article that mentions him that completely fell through the cracks. Is there any possibility of that or can we just chalk Raymond Alberga to being a rumor written in by some bored kid in 2008 wanting to cause havoc and complete mayhem and discord in the GTA community?

[Max Payne]

On 3/19/2009 at 10:49 AM, Mafioso86 said:

I think it was Ray Boccino's original name or perhaps just a mixup... I seem to remember one of the early previews last year talking about Packie introducing Niko to a mob guy named Ray Alberga.

Doesn’t answer your question but found this user who claimed to have seen a preview.

[universetwisters]

3 hours ago, Max Payne said:

Doesn’t answer your question but found this user who claimed to have seen a preview.

So it was a magazine or some other article that did a preview of Harboring a Grudge. Quite a shame that he never mentioned which magazine it was, otherwise it would be easy to verify or deny 

Edited February 12, 2024 by universetwisters

[TaylorSwiftDies2038]

Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked if it was simply a typo. Like maybe someone was having a rough day typing up that article in the office and the name "Raymond Alberga" came for no particular reason instead of Ray Boccino.

[universetwisters]

On 2/14/2024 at 12:24 AM, TaylorSwiftDies2038 said:

Honestly, I wouldn't be shocked if it was simply a typo. Like maybe someone was having a rough day typing up that article in the office and the name "Raymond Alberga" came for no particular reason instead of Ray Boccino.

Maybe but I'm still trying to find the source of the original preview or first mention of him to begin with

[TaylorSwiftDies2038]

On 2/15/2024 at 6:34 PM, universetwisters said:

Maybe but I'm still trying to find the source of the original preview or first mention of him to begin with

 

If you can't find it, perhaps someone pulled it out of their own ass and it got repeated as legit information. It happens from time to time.

 

Like the infamous Polybius legend. While variants of the legend may have existed as early as 1982, the actual Polybius legend wasn't created until 2000 and was a marketing ploy to drive internet traffic to the coin-op database website, and it was successful.

 

Here's one that was from a simple spelling mistake from the 18th century:

Wikipedia's King who Doesn't Exist (youtube.com)

 

I know these are super random examples, but a part of me suspects "Raymond Alberga" was something that was pulled out of the ass by some random dude on the internet looking for easy clout. Reminds me of some of the wild-ass beta rumors back in the day like a supposed GTA III Dreamcast version that supposedly reached alpha playable stage but was cancelled.

[SM-W]

2 hours ago, TaylorSwiftDies2038 said:

Like the infamous Polybius legend. While variants of the legend may have existed as early as 1982, the actual Polybius legend wasn't created until 2000 and was a marketing ploy to drive internet traffic to the coin-op database website, and it was successful.

Ahoy did a YouTube video on that - love his style and content.

 

2 hours ago, TaylorSwiftDies2038 said:

a part of me suspects "Raymond Alberga" was something that was pulled out of the ass by some random dude on the internet looking for easy clout.

Nah, Raymond Alberga was real, he was going to be the protagonist of GTA San Andreas Stories

Source: My cousin's drug dealer's aunt did the hair styling for Dan Houser ...... she was terrible at it, though, hence why he's bald.

 

2 hours ago, TaylorSwiftDies2038 said:

Reminds me of some of the wild-ass beta rumors back in the day like a supposed GTA III Dreamcast version that supposedly reached alpha playable stage but was cancelled.

I think the Dreamcast could have run it, but the problem with the Dreamcast (and probably part of the reason the console failed) was because of the damn controller.

They put the single analog stick and the D-pad on the same side ..... meaning that if you were playing any kind of a game where you could move/look in all directions, often times this meant either turning/looking was both handled with the left analog stick ... or, the one that makes me chuckle, looking was left analog stick and movement was the X Y A B buttons. Y to move forward, A to go back, and X and B to strafe. To move diagonally, you pressed two buttons simultaneously. (Seriously. That was the control scheme for games like MDK2 and Fur Fighters).

 

The Dreamcast will forever hold a very special place in my heart .... but sadly, when Sega designed it in the late 90's, they had arcade ports, platformers, JRPGs and racing games in mind. They never anticipated the unprecedented breakthrough that 1st-and-3rd person shooters were about to make in the world, and were not ready when those hit big.

 

............... uh, but yeah, history aside, I don't know if GTA3 was ever planned to have a Dreamcast port like Half-Life 1 was (which, again, HL1 would never have worked with that controller).

Edited February 17, 2024 by SM-W