toblix

GTA V

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You bring up TV shows, which sounds like a great format for GTA stories to work within. GTA V would, theoretically, be made up of 24 shorter stories which shared the same story arc. That might work.

LA Noire worked a bit like that, with each case being sort of a separate film in a greater series of movies all leading to an overarching ending. I do think that format could work well for GTA as well, but I think that's only a fresh coat of paint over a crumbling wall.

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What Rockstar needs to do is take a good, hard look at Arkham City, understand what the future is for free-roaming sandbox game, scrap everything they were working on and follow that example.

Though it's hard to pinpoint why Arkham City is so great. It's the vibrancy of the world, the density, the facility of (vertical!) transportation. Tuning into the commentary of enemies around you gives the world real sense of aliveness. Side missions were great and added to the whole.

There was far less of a disconnect between all the elements of the game: the sandbox interactions, the story being told through main missions and side quests. GTA has always walled these off in their own little cubicles. Merging them would be ambitious, but necessary to keep the series modern in a post-Batman age.

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Unlike my attitude towards GTA IV before its release, this time I'm just as – if not more – excited about the potential for multiplayer awesomeness this could provide. It'll be a solid single player game, obviously, but if they make good use of the opportunity to polish off the rough edges on the multiplayer in GTA IV it can be something truly fantastic! Unfortunately, judging by their efforts in that regard with the GTA IV DLC, they tend to focus on the wrong things...

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But it isn't that easy. It's not about locking a bunch of writers in a room, it's about the writing team working with everyone else in a natural/organic manner. "Bring in better writers" is exactly how we end up with "stopping every ten seconds for exposition".

I agree that "bring in better writers" generally leads to pap, but that's why I added "for a year". I do believe that a team of talented writers should be able to come up with a decent script by then (although more time might be needed).

It's what David Fincher does with his films: He'll find a script that he likes, and then go and ask the studio for money for a year, for him and the writer to develop it further. This is all done prior to pre-production.

Unfortunately the reason why there's so much pap out there at the moment is that the studios find an idea ("remake this movie!") and then set a release date... No matter how ready the script is, the film has to start shooting because of the impending release date. It's crazy, but it happens all the time.

The last James Bond movie, for instance, was madly rushed out to meet the release date... and it showed.

As for them working organically with everyone else, I'm pretty sure the script is written before anything else -- especially on a GTA game which is pretty formulaic in its game structure? It would be extremely costly to develop any other way, surely?

Anyways, don't want to side-track this too much, it's just that I have given it a lot of thought :)

Edited by ThunderPeel2001

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What Rockstar needs to do is take a good, hard look at Arkham City, understand what the future is for free-roaming sandbox game, scrap everything they were working on and follow that example.

Though it's hard to pinpoint why Arkham City is so great. It's the vibrancy of the world, the density, the facility of (vertical!) transportation. Tuning into the commentary of enemies around you gives the world real sense of aliveness. Side missions were great and added to the whole.

There was far less of a disconnect between all the elements of the game: the sandbox interactions, the story being told through main missions and side quests. GTA has always walled these off in their own little cubicles. Merging them would be ambitious, but necessary to keep the series modern in a post-Batman age.

Wow. This really makes me want to play Batman: Arkham City! It also makes me wonder just how dated GTAV is going to be... As much as I quite enjoy the way GTA games are put together, I can see that they are quite old fashioned now. Hmm.

Edited by ThunderPeel2001

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As for them working organically with everyone else, I'm pretty sure the script is written before anything else -- especially on a GTA game which is pretty formulaic in its game structure? It would be extremely costly to develop any other way, surely?

If you read interviews with game writers, it is often the case that they are brought on late when the game is already pretty much structured. I don't know if that applies to GTA-s, though. I imagine that Uncharted for example couldn't be done in any other way than writing the script first. But for example a TES game could well be done by continuous collaboration between writers and designers, although I'm sure they may want to have some idea of what the story will be like first so that the world they create would support it. I think GTA falls somewhere in the middle, but there's even more to the game than in TES that doesn't really depend on a 'script' (like the cities themselves).

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If you read interviews with game writers, it is often the case that they are brought on late when the game is already pretty much structured. I don't know if that applies to GTA-s, though. I imagine that Uncharted for example couldn't be done in any other way than writing the script first. But for example a TES game could well be done by continuous collaboration between writers and designers, although I'm sure they may want to have some idea of what the story will be like first so that the world they create would support it. I think GTA falls somewhere in the middle, but there's even more to the game than in TES that doesn't really depend on a 'script' (like the cities themselves).

Yep, good point. I'd be willing to bet that most of the script for GTA games is done before hand, though. (Not including "mission briefing" dialogue, of course.)

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What Rockstar needs to do is take a good, hard look at Arkham City, understand what the future is for free-roaming sandbox game, scrap everything they were working on and follow that example.

Though it's hard to pinpoint why Arkham City is so great. It's the vibrancy of the world, the density, the facility of (vertical!) transportation. Tuning into the commentary of enemies around you gives the world real sense of aliveness. Side missions were great and added to the whole.

I honestly don't believe you, maybe its because I hated the first batman whatever it was, or maybe its because I know just from reading arkham city doesn't try to model a living, breathing city in the modern world, but I don't accept what you just said.

Mission structure sounds interesting, but from my outside standpoint they are two very different games. That is not to defend rockstars classic mission structure as I do agree it's time for them to change on that, because its getting a little old.

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You're right in that they're not the same thing, but there are lessons to be learned from Arkham City that GTA would benefit from.

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Ah, I should probably play Arhkam City, I just really didn't like that first game for entirely personal reasons that I wont defend.

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My only gripe with the first one was "Batman doesn't kill people. He just hits them really hard in the head". Or gets a ring out beside a huge drop.

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It's strange, today I got really excited for GTA V. Yesterday expectations tainted the experience, today I'm like fuck yes I'll be a crop-dusting midddle-aged crook in LA!

(Though I kind of cringed at the slogan for the firm: 'putting the FU in fumigation')

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(Though I kind of cringed at the slogan for the firm: 'putting the FU in fumigation')

Before GTA IV, that'd always been one of my favorite things about the series. Cheesy, corny fun.

But now I guess we have Saints Row for that kind of shit, and with the Super Serious Story they're probably going to go for in the new game, it doesn't really fit anymore.

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gta 4 was serious story wise for the most part, but still had PLENTY of satire and silliness in the billboards/radio/tv. That totally worked for me.

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gta 4 was serious story wise for the most part, but still had PLENTY of satire and silliness in the billboards/radio/tv. That totally worked for me.

Yeah I think the satire in 4 was the best of the series. There will always be the low brow stuff like FU or what have you, but for a non-American that always played towards the satire.

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gta 4 was serious story wise for the most part, but still had PLENTY of satire and silliness in the billboards/radio/tv. That totally worked for me.

Serious Story and Goofy Everything Else feels weird to me and always will feel weird to me.

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I'm just hoping that they'll add planes and some of the goofy shit from San Andreas back in. Jetpack-strapped dildo clubbing didn't get old for quite a while in that game.

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Also, while there's some great story/character stuff in Gay Tony, that episode was largely ridiculous and over the top.

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Also, while there's some great story/character stuff in Gay Tony, that episode was largely ridiculous and over the top.

The impression I got from Gay Tony (that impression being nothing but the game and a few screenshots, granted) is that it is over the top and ridiculous, and you confirm that impression. But Niko's story, the narrative, at least, was supposed to be a story about a man trying, and subsequently failing, to escape his past. Or some such.

I liked GTA IV. A lot, actually. Gay Tony seemed like it was a different direction. Like it wasn't super serious.

I fully expect GTA V proper to follow GTA IV proper's tone.

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The impression I got from Gay Tony (that impression being nothing but the game and a few screenshots, granted) is that it is over the top and ridiculous, and you confirm that impression. But Niko's story, the narrative, at least, was supposed to be a story about a man trying, and subsequently failing, to escape his past. Or some such.

I liked GTA IV. A lot, actually. Gay Tony seemed like it was a different direction. Like it wasn't super serious.

I fully expect GTA V proper to follow GTA IV proper's tone.

There's actually some great character stuff in gay tony, it just happens to also be ridiculous at the same time. That said while I liked 4, I actually liked both the episodes more. I do hope we get multiple protagonists, the shorter story arcs of the episodes were more appealing to me.

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Yeah, the character stuff in Gay Tony was great. I really enjoyed it. It was the gameplay that was OTT. They clearly decided to try and do as many things they could in their final trip through Liberty City... They also made the missions a lot more difficult to cater for those who had mastered GTAIV.

As for the "satirical" signs and billboards in GTAIV... Can't say I was a fan.

"Hmm. We need a name for the internet cafe.... Any ideas?"

"Well, it'll have to be something rude and shocking. Um, I know! 'Tw@'!".

"Genius! How about an image for the beer billboard?"

"Um. The beer's called 'Pisswasser', right?"

*both chuckle*

"...Well need something that's rude and shocking again. I know! How about a woman pissing into the beer bottle!"

"Incredible. Have a cigar. And a raise."

Edited by ThunderPeel2001

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Niko's story, the narrative, at least, was supposed to be a story about a man trying, and subsequently failing, to escape his past. Or some such.

Wait. Isn't that GTAV's story?

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The worst thing about GTA V is that I probably won't play nearly as much multiplayer as I did of IV, because my living arrangements have changed and I've generally become a bit rubbish. I also think I burnt out pretty badly on IV, as well as the other games I played with Thumbs. A shame.

Other than that, I'm moderately excited. The trailer wasn't nearly as good as the first GTA IV one, but I like the look of the protagonist. Sure, he's a bit of a cliché, but as far as games go it's a pretty unusual archetype for the player character. Could be fun.

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