Exploring the (Open) World

[JazzFunk]

43 missions out of 69 in GTAV now.

If it weren't for the sticks I'd like it better, it would've been greater with the upper 30% of the map removed, more fun and compact, more punchy, the city is where it's at in this game, got a beach as well.

I'm not bothered about the hilly bits. I could've saved hours of gaming without protracted journeys through the sticks. I guess it gives a sense of vastness but it don't really have owt special up there, it's a bit limp.

[JazzFunk]

45/69 missions so far. I said I'd do 46 before beddy-bye-boes, giving me 66% Mission-wise, ie. two thirds of the main game.

OCD says YES, I have to do one more. I don't mind, I'm liking it, despite it basically having the same controls and choppiness of GTAIV...which incidentally I clocked in Sept '09,bout the time of swine flu on a week off sick from work with swine flu.

Feels funny playing the sequel to it nearly nine years after I completed GTAIV. And it shares many of the same flaws.


But it's still a wonder and I salute it, the more I play consistently, the more I am impressed by the excellent engine, I have experienced many visual wonderments tonite.

[JazzFunk]

Just did my 46th now I'll shut the funk up but 66% now I can breeeeeathe.

[Neon Ignition]

I really do find it hard to pin down what it is that makes or breaks them for me.

GTA3 - It's great, the layout of Liberty City in this game is so heavily engrained in my mind and it was endlessly fun simply driving around its streets

Vice City - Was okay, never sat with me as strong as Liberty and I feel like part of it is that it was a very flat city and had less distinct areas than Liberty did

San Andreas - Is a funny one, I prefer the game to Vice City as I felt it played better but it was the key location markers that made it and how open it was. The actual three cities in the game are the weakest of the three PS2 era entries as the design wasn't that strong

GTA4 - Liberty City here sucks. Very little of sticks in the mind, it's miserable to look at and lacks many interesting landmarks which is compounded by the poor driving mechanics

GTA5 - After 4 I went in pessimistic but quickly was won over in a similar way to GTA3's Liberty. Great design, mixed things up nicely

With stuff like Witcher 3, it's objectively pretty but I feel like the open worlds exist more as a form of runtime padding. So much effort is put into making the spaces as expansive as possible but feature very little of interest. There has to be something on the horizon that teases you to head towards it and then once you get there you have to find something genuinely interesting with another tease on the horizon. Too many games simply have the open world simply be a picturesque location.

It's one of the stumbling blocks I'd label against Breath of the Wild. I think in part its open world functions well, it's designed in a way that makes use of Links abilities so you have to keep some mind to how to reach shrines and towers etc. But it's also a bland space for the most part, like it's only half developed. After a few hours it becomes repetitive.

Again though, these are games that some gamers absolutely adore as masterpieces and so will have the polar opposite view on so its very much a personal taste thing.

For me though, certainly open worlds are good but most times smaller is better as it places the focus on using the space rather than making more of it.

[QualityChimp]

If you're a bit anal and absolutely must clean all those ?s off your map (i.e. me), it can become a very dreary kind of torture.

I'm still haunted by that last remaining agility orb in Crackdown.
I can hear it's pulsing call mocking me in my sleep sometimes.

[QualityChimp]

Just did my 46th now I'll shut the funk up but 66% now I can breeeeeathe.

I need to get back into this at some point.

I stopped playing GTAV when I didn't really know how to win big on the stock markets, but it doesn't really matter.
I should just get it done.

There were times I'd be flying over the city, just amazed at what Rockstar had achieved. It's a massive playground filled with dozens of distractions and it's actually quite beautiful. Watching the sun set as you fly to the coast and then the ferris wheel lights up and the neon glow of the tail lights pepper the streets below.

I've done loads of the side-quests, but didn't do much of the story.
Money cases, UFO parts, submarine parts, completed the murder mystery and so on.

[Neon Ignition]

On reflection Deadly Premonition is an interesting one as it's probably the opposite of what I've said.

It's open world doesn't really feature anything interesting in it, it's incredibly mundane and lacks anything of real note within it other than it's Twin Peaksness. It's an issue compounded by how awful the driving experience is with the boxy, slow driving and refuelling mechanic... however, the game forces you to take your time so you have no choice but to take in the surroundings as you're held hostage to the experience. This goes on throughout the entire game and yet when the story ends and you're dropped back in town and everythings over... I felt compelled to get in the car and take one last trip around because by that point the town was as much a part of the experience and as much a character in its own right as anything else in that clunky, strange and wonderful game.

[QualityChimp]

There definitely needs to be a balance between map size and things to do.

GTAV is amazing because there's something to do or an event all over the map.
Even if you ride the cable car to the top of Mount Chilead, just once, You can basejump off, mountain bike down and so on.

I nearly bought Fuel, because the massive map sounded fantastic, but I read about it and it sounded like there was a whole lot of nothing. I'd rather play something like Driver: San Francisco, with a smaller map, but has more interesting scenery and more going on.

I also enjoyed the map on Sleeping Dogs, which made a nice change from American maps.

[H-Man]

Open world games are great for many reasons, but I do feel they're getting too big. Particularity when they get to the point where fast travel becomes mandatory for sanity - which is usually when my interest starts to fade. You run through valleys and climb mountains never to see them again. It all becomes a backdrop blur. What i'd like - and to my knowledge that hasn't been a video game that's done this - is world say the size of the starting location in Horizon Zero Dawn that you really have to get to know. You know where the good fishing spots are, where to get a good vantage point, where you could set a good ambush if being chased etc. So much more could be crammed into the world while still being pretty vast. Just not so vast it becomes meaningless.

[JazzFunk]

As I've only got about eighteen GTAV missions to do, been having more of an explore but found something *really* disappointing that ruptures the sense of immersion.

You can't go into hospitals or fast food shops anymore. It was always fun to have a shottie rampage in Cluckin' Bell. There are hardly any interior spaces, it seems there are a few places you CAN go into but Jeezis Cripez why the hell they take such a fun element out???!!!

[cutmymilk]

That should have all been part of the single player expansions before online ruined those plans.

[Neon Ignition]

I think single player expansions are done forever in Rockstar games, they were never convinced by the profit of the GTA4 expansions so online gave them the perfect excuse to jack it in. It's how belated it makes their games that annoys me, five years since GTAV...

[QualityChimp]

Yeah, single-player DLC is never going to happen. In fact, they reappropriated hidden assets to become Doomsday Heist:

https://kotaku.com/the-endless-hunt-for-gta-v-s-missing-single-player-dlc-1821653934

"In 2015, Tez Funz, a data miner with a track record of finding unannounced GTA V content, found new code that appeared to be a part of a DLC expansion. This code referred to new missions, including a new heist involving a casino, jetpacks and something called “Clifford.” The code specifically referenced Trevor, a playable character from the story, and also appeared to have mission triggers designed for single player. At the time, players thought Clifford could be a reference to a new city or town, or perhaps was an unrelated codename.

Two years later, Tez Funz’ data mine was bolstered by the addition of the Doomsday Heist, which added a jet pack, more heists, and a smart AI called Clifford—except it was for the multiplayer segment of GTA, not the single-player."

A document was also mined that supposedly reveals some of the proposed DLC:
"I was able to get a copy of the alleged document after speaking to a few users who wanted to remain anonymous because the document was supposedly given to them in confidence. What I got was a large text file that purported to show notes from developers at Rockstar detailing three possible DLC episodes for GTA V. One involves Trevor and the IAA (GTA’s CIA), another spoke of zombies, and the final DLC described by the document was about an alien invasion. Exactly when this document started floating around on the internet is not concrete, but most data miners I spoke to believe it was around 2014.

Around the same time the document began floating around, GTA data miner Tez Funz posted information about a possible GTA V DLC involving the CIA/IAA. The code pointed to mission locations and triggers for the single player portion of GTA V. This seemed to line up with what was found in the doc. More recently, years later after the dissemination of the document, the latest update for GTA Online has players working with IAA to help save the world.

Earlier this year, fans also found a GTA Online secret mission involving an alien egg, and a recent GTA Online update also added an image of an apparent alien attack as a floor vinyl option for player owned garages. The “alien” segment of the document seemed to come true, at least for GTA Online."

GTA Online has generated at least $500 million in revenue in 2016, and 2017 was GTA Online’s most profitable year and 2013's Grand Theft Auto V is back atop the UK Charts:
"Since I've been listing the weekly charts, a lot of you fine folk have been flabbergasted by GTAV's ability to maintain consistent high placing this far into its life. While I could write an entire essay on reasons why, learned from years of standing behind shop counters, it is essentially the result of several factors.
Firstly, GTAV is a go-to entry purchase with almost every console sold. When people pick up "a PS4/Xbox and some games," one of those games, more often that not, is GTAV. It is also consistently cheap, and usually included in sales and bundle deals. GTA games are also the single most consumer-damaged discs, requiring re-purchases, sometimes multiple times by the same customers.

GTAV is a very popular "itch-scratching" title, with many customers re-selling and re-buying the title in a perpetual cycle of repetition. Finally, the game's controversy simply never, ever stops inquisitive kids from wanting to get their mitts on it, long after everyone else has long gotten over its dubious themes.

Again, this isn't even scratching the surface on what has enabled Rockstar's digital crime spree to run and run for the past five years, and likely into the near-future, but just the pattern I've personally witnessed for GTAV and its many predecessors."

Also, don't forget that Doomsday Heist was heavily promoted from the telly to the cinema.

[Neon Ignition]

I know GTA exists in some sort of bubble whereby its popularity is persistent but I'd be curious as to how large a proportion of the playerbase actively uses the Online mode.

They clearly still make an absolute mint from it but it does mean GTA6 isn't even a blip on the horizon as they don't want to hurt the current cash cow. It's like RDR2, it's great it's finally here but by slowing down their releases it means an entire generation of gamers exists where their games aren't quite as in their mind set. Say Rockstar makes a fortune from GTA Online but that money comes from less than 10% of GTAs fanbase, it means that over 90% are disengaged from the franchise for potentially over a decade. They've been fine so far but that's a long time to hope no rivals come along, the market doesn't shift, the next product isn't a failure etc and it somewhat dilutes that money coming in when they go so long without a new product that it has to sustain the studio for a decade.

I expect GTA6 will arrive this gen, if only at the very end so they can pull the double dip trick again across gens, but one game per generation... feels a dangerous method regardless of how successful that title is.

[cutmymilk]

Unfortunately I think it's the other way around now. People buy it to play Online.