Everyone whose played Grand Theft Auto 3 or 4 has said the same thing to themselves, "This would make an awesome online game!" For years the dream of a GTA MMO has been a flight of idle fancy.

But now, everyone who ever wanted to ransack a persistent city online with a bunch of their friends is about to see their dreams come true. APB, billed as a massive-multiplayer cops-and-robbers game, is coming to E3 next month. I know what you're saying; APB isn't Grand Theft Auto. That's true, but both games share the same father.

David Jones, who created GTA back in '96, is also going to be the man at the helm of APB. In this new game, players will be able to join either Squads or Gangs. Squads of police officers will fight to stop those violent gangsters from committing their nefarious deeds. The gangsters meanwhile will be busy stealing cars, robbing banks, and breaking the law in thousands of other ways.

APB promises an extreme degree of customization, right down to the gang colors your character represents, or the cliched mustache under your grizzled cop's nose. Jones promises "ultimate freedom" to characters, who will have multiple (enormous) real world cities to wreak havoc in. We'll be getting our first in-game glimpses of APB at E3. No release date has been set as of yet, but we'll hopefully see this baby come out sometime in 2010.