Why you hate so much, I bet you payed those games.I know that may not say much. but they are there, and everything that is particular and more when you talking about SANDBOX open world. it always people will be comparing them. because they are famous and is the same aim as the GTA and all the games that are sandboxes.
Well, GTA games have nice, big worlds, but story and missions in those games are so damn boring. Most of missions are:
1) drive through the whole city to the checkpoint (it takes 5-10 minutes)
2) kill guy/guys (it takes 1-5 minutes)
3) missions accomplished
Missions, for most of time are about going from point A to point B in the car. Of course there are also quite interesting missions like bank robbery in GTAIV, but they are still just "ok". I don't remember a single mission that would make me like "OMG! This was amazing".
GTA games are great for open-world mayhem with friends, but other than that they are just "meh" for me.