So, I broke down and purchased a PS3. The PS3 GTA 5 Bundle that is.
With the cost of the major consoles dropping with the coming release of the PS4 and Xbox One there didn’t seem to be much reason not to. But enough about that I want to talk about GTA V, so I present to you my GTA 5: Post Story Completion and Online thoughts good and bad.
Story Mode:
Story mode alone is worth purchasing the game. Complex, beautiful, rich in detail, and most importantly entertaining, this title delivers on the hype. Adding in random encounters to break up the “Use the GPS to navigate to a mission” really makes thing interesting and I often found myself looking forward to seeing that little blue blip on the radar. One thing that on reflection caught me was the theme to the game, the real plot. We’re introduced to Franklin and he appears to be the primary character, but in retrospect I don’t believe this. Michael is the main focus of the story, and Frank and Trevor simply represent the internal conflicts Michael is faced with. Michael is a failure as a father, largely due to a past he is trying to escape. Trevor is the link to that past, it is only natural that his re-emergence into Michael’s life comes after a relapse into the criminal world. Franklin though becomes a surrogate son, an individual that represents Michael passing down the only skills he ever acquired….how to be a excellent thief.
The setup for all the missions is another good addition to the game, being able to decide on more than one route to committing a major heist gives the game serious replay value as you’ll want to see how things work out differently by completing jobs different ways. As does some of the individual missions such as the assassinations for Franklin. Using the Stock Market accessible from a laptop at your safe house or from your phone you can make a lot of money by investing in companies due a huge bump in stock value due to “deletions” enacted by Franklin at the request of Lester, a criminal mastermind and conspiracy theorist.
Now the game world isn’t perfect, I won’t say that it is, but sometimes the satirical nature of the game goes to an extreme. Over usage of the infamous “N-word” in some cut scenes and conversations between characters for some can seem down right appalling, as are many of the depictions of women in the game. Michael’s wife is habitually unfaithful to him over the course of the game, with at one point their daughter and son listing off around a dozen men. On the talk radio station you can listen too in your vehicle there are several female guests who are depicted as either gold diggers or deranged lunatics. Men are typically portrayed as womanizing, control freaks, and players as well all to an extreme. To be honest there isn’t much that isn’t made fun of in some light both in a good or bad way. Politics, the Economy, Militaristic security firms (basically mercenary companies), Big Oil, Big Tobacco, the Film Industry, Reality Shows, and Gangs all get slapped around for comedic purposes. There are even pot shots at Facebook and Apple in the form of the fictional company “Life Invader”.
On the whole though this is an excellent game and worth playing through at least once. Though it would be been better if the accessories for the game such as the iFruit app was ready for market at release. Currently it is only available on Apple Devices.
Online Mode:
This is where I begin to find serious fault. I like to think of this as a separate game because honestly it is horrible in implementation. GTA: Online suffers from the same affliction that games such as Counterstrike, and Halo do: Chaos simply for the purpose of Chaos, there is absolutely no social value in GTA: Online. This might be fine from some people but not me, I’m not big on the idea of Open PvP in any game. Let me run down a quick list of what I find serious fault with.
- No Open World Structure. As I mentioned Chaos is simply for the sake of Chaos with no inherit social value. If all the Player vs Player interaction were based on Mini-games such as the Survival or Team vs Team death matches and the various types and styles of races I’d be ok with it. As it is many people use the Open PvP aspect as an excuse to be jackasses, just like in every MMO out there, except the excessive repetitiveness, and poorly disguised grinding make it often feel like being a jackass is all GTA: Online was actually designed for. As Captain James Hook would say “Bad form!” (Yes that was cheezy, but so is GTA: Online).
- No Balancing. Between a full time College schedule and Work, I find little time to really invest in building up a character. When I do get to play Online, I always seem to get matched with people who are 10-40+ levels higher, this takes any competitiveness out of the game. No matter what I am simply out gunned, since I don’t have the majority of weapons unlocked, or the benefits for having stats and skills developed that give higher level players a very large advantage in everything you can take part in. They shoot more accurately, drive faster with more control, and as mentioned have access to far superior equipment. Rockstar could have taken a page out of Bioware’s book on this one and made it so only similar level players could group à la SWTOR’s war zones.
- Really poor Bounty System. Someone is being a jerk? Put a bounty on them! At least that’s the idea, but instead the system is being used as a mini-game for crews. Often I’ll login to find I’m in a clean session with no other players only for 15 minutes later get a popup saying “Some one has placed a $5000 bounty on you!” Sure enough, a crew (Crews = Guilds) have arrived and now I’m the evenings entertainment. If this isn’t as intended, there are no measures to deal with this type of behavior, other than spending your own GTA $$$ to remove the bounty, or change sessions. If this is working as intended, WTF Rockstar?
There are some upsides, you can create Sessions with rules on who can join, if , you do so from inside the story mode game. Not being able to create Invite, Crew Only, Friend Only, or Closed sessions in any other manner diminishes the game somewhat due to the loading times when the game first starts up. If you do run one of these closed, semi-closed, or invite only sessions the game is much more enjoyable, and would benefit to the point of actually being a decent game if the balancing issues were addressed.
Of course all of this is simply my opinion, feel free to check out the game, and make your own opinions. And also feel free to reply here and let us know what you think.