GTA V

[CjEggett]

Seems like there is a lot of story to go through to unlock everything you can do. I know this was the case in the old GTA games, but I guess I had more time back then!

 

Still, I was able to drive a car up a mountain and joyfully roll to my fiery death, and be chased across the map by police before finally making my escape by diving into a marsh-land/river estuary, and do a shitty half jump to I crack my chin on a ledge and fall to the floor like an athletic sack of potatoes. I am playing a video game.

 

Oh, I found a road bike too. I'm happy about that - I just need to find myself some nice lycra.

[clyde]

So I've never been to California. Is the area Trevor lives in representative of a real place? I find it hard to believe that a neighborhood would be formed in the desert by people parking their trailers and opening up liquor stores. If his town is representative, what was the industry that encouraged people to settle the real town.

Also, I hope we eventually get to have an in depth conversation about Tonya. I do her missions as soon as I get them because I want to hear and watch her talk. For me, she is the most interesting character, 17% in.

[CjEggett]

So I've never been to California. Is the area Trevor lives in representative of a real place? I find it hard to believe that a neighborhood would be formed in the desert by people parking their trailers and opening up liquor stores. If his town is representative, what was the industry that encouraged people to settle the real town.

 

I've never been, but if you have ever had a passing interest in mining/extraction you'll realise that they're living a pretty comfortable version of what people who live near the pits do.

 

To me it looks like a place that was a mining or maybe iodine extraction community some time ago, and people have been settled there for a while.

 

Saying that, I haven't got that far in the game, I was just passing through after flinging myself off a mountain.

[Yasawas]

This game is a fun game and although I've only played about three hours it certainly seems to address most of the issues I had with GTA IV. And I kinda liked that one too.

 

Do I need to look after the special cars each character has or do they infintely respawn if I ruin or misplace them? If they respawn, if I upgrade or paint one does it also apply to the others? I'm a bit confused by it. I assumed Frankin had an infinite amount of sweet, white rides but then at one point I went into the Los Santos Customs down Grove Street, got into some car called an Elegy (it was the only one in the inventory, where did this come from?), went for a drive, ditched it and told me it had been impounded and it was all very confusing.

 

Haven't been exploring the countryside yet but if people are climbing Mount Chilliad in the far north does that mean nothing is locked off from the start this time, geographically anyway?

[CjEggett]

Haven't been exploring the countryside yet but if people are climbing Mount Chilliad in the far north does that mean nothing is locked off from the start this time, geographically anyway?

 

Nothing seems be locked off geographically. Some activities are locked off however. I think I am going to try and get to the north coast this evening.

[clyde]

Can the map be turned off, and if so is it practical? One thing I always liked pre-GTA4 was that I was made to pay attention to landmarks and such, and I very quickly learnt the cities. I never really learnt GTA4's Liberty City despite 60+ hours in it because I was forever focused on the map. It'd be nice if there were something like Tomb Raider where you can press a button to see where your waypoints are.

You can turn it off, but it's not pratical while playing the story. The yellow spots that you stand in to trigger cutscenes aren't very apparent without the radar.

[RubixsQube]

So I've never been to California. Is the area Trevor lives in representative of a real place? I find it hard to believe that a neighborhood would be formed in the desert by people parking their trailers and opening up liquor stores. If his town is representative, what was the industry that encouraged people to settle the real town.

 

North and east of Los Angeles, getting up towards Nevada, there are definitely areas that are reminiscent of the northern parts of the game. I mean, the Salton Sea and the tiny town on its shores are in the game as the Alamo Sea and Sandy Shores. I haven't unlocked the Trevor portion of the game yet, but I'm 100% sure that it will show the kind of crazies who live out near Barstow in and around the Mojave Desert. 

[Frenetic Pony]

Ok, for those thinking Saints Row is the only open world game capable of making fun of itself and being spastically insane and in sync with any murderous rampages you go on hooking up with the story, I can say GTA V is back far closer to Vice City than 4 or even San Andreas was.

 

When you go to Michael's shrink he talks about murdering random people "I think I killed a guy on the way over here today, and you know what? I didn't care!" You also get a hallucinatory rampage against aliens while wielding a minigun after you smoke some heavy dope with him. And that's the straight laced guy, I haven't even gotten Trevor, who's already been described as the psychotic mass murdering wild animal of the three.

 

So, yeah. It's still not balls out crazy, but there's much more acknowledgement and even embracement of the idea of over the top insanity in the story than there ever was in 4. It's kind of hard to even assume it asks you to take it too seriously when on one of the first missions a conversation takes place to the effect of "Isn't this being a little melodramatic?" "Yeah, well... whatever." as you

yank an entire house down using a winch and a towtruck

.

[elmuerte]

 I can say GTA V is back far closer to Vice City than 4 or even San Andreas was.

That's great to hear.

[thestalkinghead]

That's great to hear.

i agree, it's great to hear, because vice city and san andreas knew they were crazy and embraced it, but 4 tried to pretend it was all serious and that kind of ruined a lot of the fun

[Erkki]

Why have we let Metacritic have so much power? Their description of how they create their Metascores is one of the most mystifying things I've read on the internet. Hey did you know that a "score" between "75 and 89" represents "generally favorable reviews"? On any video game. (If it's a movie, though, it's 61 through 80, so watch out.) Reading this description is like that moment when you're watching a politician answer a "tough question" and they say fifty things without actually saying anything at all. Metacritic, you are correct to call Metascores "magic" because they are smoke and mirrors and that smoke is all up our butts.

You know, I think the difference between movie scores and game scores is actually all right. If you watch a bad movie, you've only wasted a couple of hours (and maybe a few bucks). If you start playing a bad game, you may have wasted 60€ and if you still want to play through it, you'll waste potentially tens of hours (but you probably don't). So if you make purchasing decisions based on review scores, it's fine to expect better scores from games you would buy than movies you would watch.

 

But yeah, scores should be killed.

[clyde]

The game has random events like Red Dead Redemption had. But the tactics you get used to using do not always match the urgent situation. I could roleplay a little more convincingly, but my first thought is to pull out an assault rifle in a public park when I hear someone shout "Stop him, I just bought that bike!". Good thing my gun had a suppressor. I might have frightened the people wearing hipster costumes who were popping a squat.

Now it feels awkward returning the bike. I should just keep it so the initial victim doesn't feel personally responsible for the dead body in the highway.

[youmeyou]

When all you have is a gun every problem looks like a dead body! 

 

In other news, Leigh Alexander's excellent review-song got a cover:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=8HZ21Lsw5WE

[clyde]

Straight up:

This sucks. I'm about 20% through the game and loving it, but now it wants me to torture a dude and I'm really not comfortable with it.

If I talk about it right now, I'll be speaking from my frustration so I'll wait.

I didn't watch the video Greg put up and just naively assumed that it would either be not-so-bad or optional. This feels disgusting. Maybe later.

I want to play the rest of the game.

This must be what entitlement feels like. I really appreciate how the Call of Duty series includes that objectionable-content off-switch. With a movie I can just look away. Here, I can't continue to play the game unless I get someone else to do it or somehow dumb my sensitivity. I'd much prefer not to do either.

[Ucantalas]

So, I got GTAV today, and only played for... maybe an hour? 

 

Here are my first impressions: Jesus christ I suck at this game. Holy crap do I suck. Driving seems really difficult to me, and I've died at least 6 times already (and thats just straight-up deaths; don't get me started on the times I've failed missions because I suck at driving)

[clyde]

So, I got GTAV today, and only played for... maybe an hour?

Here are my first impressions: Jesus christ I suck at this game. Holy crap do I suck. Driving seems really difficult to me, and I've died at least 6 times already (and thats just straight-up deaths; don't get me started on the times I've failed missions because I suck at driving)

Wait until you have to land a plane.

[Frenetic Pony]

Eeecth, a torture scene?

 

I guess it's weird to complain about a torture scene after I just ran over a dozen people, got into a chase, and shot 4 cops to death. Then again it's also weird that I can do that "for fun" and feel bad about needing to kill a virtual dog because there was no way to get away from it attacking me (no cars around to steal).

 

I also wonder what the next gen version is going to look like, because for how good this game looks most of the time it's also rather.... barren. Just last summer I was camping and went to a small wooded town near the campsite with my relatives, and just had fun looking around the town (I live in California). In comparison GTAV is rather sparse at times, while some of this is accurate to southern California, the small woodside town leaves a disappointing "this generation" taste to them.

 

Oh, and Trevor is the best playable character. He's kind of a "Heisenberg" type character, except he makes Walt look like a well adjusted peace loving pacifist. He's friggen hilarious.

[80's Bad Guy]

Wait until you have to land a plane.

 

Tried and failed a few times at it last night. Luckily it's pretty forgiving. But it did give me nightmares about old PC flight sims. 

 

Stay on target. 

[clyde]

I really enjoy the flying. I especially like how you hit turbulence and when my right engine got damaged and failed, my plane would constantly bank slightly to the right. I love finicky vehicles.

[Wrestlevania]

Pinch/grain of salt, but NeoGaf's rumour-mongering about the existence of a PC version.

[Thrik]

Looks like one of the console versions being recorded via a HDMI-in or something. What kind of muppet would run the PC version in a 720p window with lowered graphics settings?

 

A PC version almost certainly exists whether it's destined for release or not, where else would those amazing official screenshots come from that don't resemble the actual game in the slightest? With the leaked code also showing evidence of XBone and PS4 builds though, I would say they're on their way. Based on what I've seen of the 360/PS3 versions, it looks like a game that was built to be played on better hardware.

[melmer]

Good, i'm glad you are still a believe! I almost buckled, i was watching a video of it earlier and it looked like a lot of dumb fun, dumb fun that i'm missing out on!

I've got a three day weekend starting tomorrow with not much to do (i have loads to do but i'm too lazy, i half fitted a new dish washer last Sunday i really should finish that off) so i thought what the hell, i'll pick it up on the way home.... but then the idea of a standing in a shop holding a copy of GTA V is super embarrassing, mega cringe. I don't want anyone to think i am one of them, one of those cunts filling up my facebook feed with picture of GTAV shaped packages from amazon. Groan over, i'm holding out for next gen... and then actually never play it.... but then get it free on PS+ and playing it for an 1 hour before quitting because it feels really dated.

It really is hard work being this much of an asshole

[toblix]

Wait, wait, wait. They improved on all the things from GTA IV, and then forgot to add a «restart mission» button?

[toblix]

Well shit:

This is totally what I'm getting. Between this and the problems with installing the play disc on Xbox 360, it looks like Rockstar has optimized for optical media, and wasn't prepared for hard disk installs. Since there wasn't a day 0 patch, I hope they'll fix this shortly.

 

Also, I bet that becasue shit sucks, if I got the Blu-ray version of the game, I wouldn't be able to continue where I left off with the PSN one. And since everything is marketing secret, I don't know if they even can fix the PSN version – maybe not being able to stream simultaneously from hard disk and Blu-ray is too limiting.

 

At this point I'm very close to waiting for a PC/next-gen release. What a disappointment.

[Flynn]

Yeah it's not that they optimized FOR disc, it's that Rockstar squeezes as much speed as possible out of the old systems by streaming form the disc and hard drive at the same time.

 

Reportedly users who have upgraded their PS3s with aftermarket 7200 RPM Drives, or even SSDs, don't have the problem playing only from drive.