Grand Theft Auto Grieving Thread - Yep, I've been drinkin' again...

[Captain Syrup]

Oh, ye gods! My speedrun is ruined!

 

[The Last Stand]

GTA: San Andreas has terrible draw distance. It literally looks like the engine is falling apart trying to render everything at once.

 

[TVStactic]

GTA: San Andreas has terrible draw distance. It literally looks like the engine is falling apart trying to render everything at once.

that is not a pc exclusive problem, just saying...

 

[Anachronistic]

Buy this game if you know what's good for you.

Streets of LA had better music and a better world than San Andreas, so it had something going for it.

I played it alot when I was young and I still have my PS2 copy stashed away. I always found the Bad Ending more satisfying than the Neutral Ending if only that a Die-Hard-esque bank standoff is more action packed than a shootout around chinatown.

 

[Cod of War]

 

[Captain Syrup]

4 is being re-assessed in a positive light? All I remember is critics dunking on it for the "LET'S GO BOWLING" nonsense.

It feeds into the narrative that gamers are sheep.

 

[CWCissey]

Hatred of GTAO is the glue which binds us together.

Meanwhile, 4 is being re-assessed in a positive light? All I remember is critics dunking on it for the "IT'S ROMAN LET'S GO BOWLING" nonsense.

It feeds into the narrative that gamers are sheep.

I played through IV again recently and I'll have to say I did not hear a peep from Roman.

Dwayne on the other hand...

 

[TVStactic]

Hatred of GTAO is the glue which binds us together.

Meanwhile, 4 is being re-assessed in a positive light? All I remember is critics dunking on it for the "IT'S ROMAN LET'S GO BOWLING" nonsense.

It feeds into the narrative that gamers are sheep.

GTA4's driving physics is a extreme level of autism that isn't even funny.
i can't for the life of me to bring myself to play it or the xpacs either.
it's like whoever made GTA4 forgot that ABS brakes were invented in 1960 and it's main production hit on 1980's. only on third worlds and such ABS brakes were implemented late and it was about 1990's or so because i owned a 2002 car and it had ABS brakes...
if a nigga says that "GTA4's driving requires skill" he's full of rotten shit.

 

[The Last Stand]

if a nigga says that "GTA4's driving requires skill" he's full of rotten shit.

To be fair, you need a high IQ to execute IV's driving.

GTA San Andreas' Playback FM and Bounce FM stations were hidden gems.

Fun fact: Masta Ace's Me and the Biz is Masta Ace impersonating Biz Markie.

 

[Quintex96]

Dwayne on the other hand...

Dwayne might be in the running for the saddest, post pathetic person ever depicted in a video game. The only reason I don't put him out of his misery is because I like Playboy X's car and safehouse.

 

[X Pac Heat]

I'm going to die believing that GTA IV is an awful GTA game.

 

[Mr. 0]

I played through IV again recently and I'll have to say I did not hear a peep from Roman.

Dwayne on the other hand...

TRY HARDER

 

[MirrorNoir]

No one really talks about the Ballad of Gay Tony. Why is that?

A couple of reasons:

1. Was initially released as a download only game/expansion and was oveshadowed by fellow download Lost and the Damned (which came out first) and by the time it got a physical release, no one cared.

2. Was created explicitly to be light and soft, in terms of tone due to some fans complaining that GTA4-era games were super bleak and depressing and devoid of fun. But some people complained that it was too silly, especially since it recast the big bad of the GTA4 era games as a comic relief villain

3. It's plot is paper thing and, IIRC, mostly exists to patch over some plot holes from the main game and doesn't offer anything new.

But in general, it exists mainly as an afterthought to wrap up loose ends from GTA4 and to throw fans a bone over complaints about the grim dark GTA4 era. It's a decent expansion for what it is, but it would have been better received had they released it first THEN Lost and the Damned.

I have always maintained that if Rockstar were to release a Undead Nightmare style zombie/apocalypse DLC for GTA in that setting it would sell better than most independent games in that category, maybe even better than Left 4 Dead etc. Because think of it, it would be the perfect setting - urban sandbox environment, have limited resources modes on, hordes of enemies instead of traffic. But any kind of single player DLC for GTA V would have been better than the shitfest combo of shark cards and reskinned vehicles most of the time. I will say I enjoy the bikers and some of the vehicles that have been added but some of this shit seems a bit superfluous. KITT from Knight Rider? A flying, armed Delorean? A fucking submarine you can dock offshore? At some point even GTA seems to have jumped the shark.

IIRC they actually DID have plans for a zombie expansion. But scrapped it when GTA Online was a huge big titted hit and stuff/digital assets from the planned side expansions were repurposed for GTAO.

That said, the cynic in me wonders if they'll be saving the zombie stuff for when they finally shutter the GTA5 version of Online and force everyone to move to whatever the fuck GTA6 Online looks like. IE one last apocalyptic event to end all apocalyptic even to end that digital world before relocating everyone/making everyone start over from zero on the next incarnation of GTA and it's setting.

I was playing Scarface: TWIY for the first time recently and it occurred to me that it had a shooting mechanic where you lock on to an enemy and fine-tune your aim two years before GTA IV. This got me thinking about other mechanics that are considered "invented" by GTA that were done earlier:

Scarface: Lock on with fine-tune, fleeing the police by escaping a radius
True Crime: NYC: Working public transportation, drivers ejected from their car on frontal impacts
Driv3r/Parallel Lines: Police officers have individual vision cones

Are there any other mechanics done first by other series?

IIRC Saints Row was the first sandbox crime game that had GPS so you know where to drive to, eliminating one of the chief problems with the PS2 era games: that unless you had a map nearby (and even if you had a map as well ) you could get super fucking lost finding out where the hell you were supposed to get to.

I think it's also why Resident Evil went to crap before because of it's lead writers died.

Resident Evil went downhill because of a serious of major fuck-ups on Capcom's part:

Sega tried to steal the franchise to prop up the Dreamcast and Sony fought back, saying they had exclusive rights to RE3. The end result was Capcom putting out a glorified filler/gaiden game as Resident Evil 3 (which takes place at the same time as RE2 and basically does jack shit to advance the plot of the series) while Dreamcast got Code Veronica, which was SUPPOSED to be RE3 and had all sorts of major lore advancements plus a "finale" of sorts that wrapped up major plot threads to serve as a finale.

RE3 was a disappointment and fans were pissy that it was a glorified side story. And no one wanted to buy a Dreamcast to play the real RE3, Code Veronica and worse, there was severe ANTI-DREAMCAST sentiment at the time from gamers over Sega holding the game hostage for as long as they humanly could. To the degree that the franchise effectively DIED because Sega held CV hostage and Dreamcast flopped HARD, to a degree that Capcom refused to do any further games for a long while. By the time Sega finally agreed to fucking let Capcom port Code Veronica to the PS2, Resident Evil was a dead franchise; to such a degree that the only people who wanted it was Nintendo; hence Capcom moving the series to the Gamecube and making a huge fucking deal about listening to the backlash for their retardation and making sure all of the games up to that point were on the Gamecube so that you didn't have to buy multiple systems to play them, along with RE Zero (which along with the remake of RE1 were one to fix the continuity issues raised with CV bringing back Wesker and other plot holes from where they were making the story up as they went along).

But it was too little too late and the franchise went full zombie (metaphorically) as a result due to none caring after they fucked up via their corrupt deal with Sega.

 

[Captain Syrup]

the franchise went full zombie (metaphorically) as a result due to none caring after they fucked up via their corrupt deal with Sega.

Who is the worst console manufacturer in the world and why is it Sega?

 

[XYZpdq]

so regarding the PSP games, if I just want to fuck around and kill people and break shit while putting no real time into the game like back in the day in GTA3 what's the best choice?

 

[Captain Syrup]

so regarding the PSP games, if I just want to fuck around and kill people and break shit while putting no real time into the game like back in the day in GTA3 what's the best choice?

VCS is annoying because you start on the mainland and you have to unlock Vice Beach. That's all I'll say.

 

[XYZpdq]

VCS is annoying because you start on the mainland and you have to unlock Vice Beach. That's all I'll say.

yeah that whole "unlock the city" shit put me off a lot of the post-3 stuff on the ps2

 

[The Last Stand]

1. Was initially released as a download only game/expansion and was oveshadowed by fellow download Lost and the Damned (which came out first) and by the time it got a physical release, no one cared.

It was easier to get the EFLC disc than downloading them separately. Especially when online wasn't their focus then.

2. Was created explicitly to be light and soft, in terms of tone due to some fans complaining that GTA4-era games were super bleak and depressing and devoid of fun. But some people complained that it was too silly, especially since it recast the big bad of the GTA4 era games as a comic relief villain

GTA IV was too dark, they try to resolve that complaint, then they complain it was too light hearted. Can't please everybody, can they.

. It's plot is paper thing and, IIRC, mostly exists to patch over some plot holes from the main game and doesn't offer anything new.

But in general, it exists mainly as an afterthought to wrap up loose ends from GTA4 and to throw fans a bone over complaints about the grim dark GTA4 era. It's a decent expansion for what it is, but it would have been better received had they released it first THEN Lost and the Damned.

That explains why they may had added the option to replay missions after finishing the storyline. I will say one thing, just when things get interesting in that saga, it just ENDS. Things go to shit, then it just wraps itself up with little explanation other than "it all works out."

I'm going to die believing that GTA IV is an awful GTA game.

I'm going to die believing that San Andreas was incredibly overrated.

 

[Captain Syrup]

GTA IV was too dark, they try to resolve that complaint, then they complain it was too light hearted. Can't please everybody, can they.

4 is oddly schizophrenic about wanting to be taken seriously while retaining its audience (15 year old boys).

RDD was a clean slate; R* could do whatever they wanted.

 

[X Pac Heat]

I'm going to die believing that San Andreas was incredibly overrated.

Agreed. Still a better GTA than GTA IV.

GTA IV isn't a bad game (although it's certainly flawed I think even if you take away GTA aspect) but it is simply a horrible GTA. The friend activities were a poor substitute for the many modes and missions that were featured in other GTA games. The vehicle physics were an absolute chore to deal with and "learn". The grounding of the open world (aka not taking the time to implement beloved vehicles and features) was a dumb idea and continues to be one of the worst cases of Hollywood-ing up a game. The reasoning behind this was especially a slap in the face (Niko is an immigrant, he wouldn't care about flying planes, using military weaponry and equipment, using parachutes, upgrading and customizing vehicles, etc. etc. after San Andreas had CJ doing all that shit). The mission structure, scripting and variety was abysmal.

GTA IV could have been a great 3rd person shooter. It's a shitty open world game. The only problem with the story is that it doesn't make sense at all when taken into context of the open world, a problem that only matters because they were so god damn serious about making the open world grounded for the sake of the story. Funny enough, GTA V is actually quite similar in this regard with the open world only being marginally better for gameplay because they re-introduced fun vehicles.

People can go on and on about how "alive" the cities feel, but at the end of the day that doesn't matter much. I can just go outside if I want a real shitty city.