Top 10 Changes We NEED in Grand Theft Auto 6
#10: Refined Driving
For a game that has you driving all across its world, “GTA” hasn’t done a compelling job with its own vehicle and driving physics. In “GTA IV”, it was practically impossible to drive anywhere without a handful of crashes. As for “GTA V”, some players feel that vehicles are way too floaty and need more weight. Even when your stats in Driving are maxed out in “GTA Online”, cars still feel like you’re piloting a cardboard box on ice. Crashes can be funny every once in a while, but when they’re happening every time we turn a corner, it’s simply infuriating.
#9: Annoying Notifications
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Some games will notify us about an event once and leave it at that. GTA Online, on the other hand, is like a nagging parent, notifying you of every little thing happening in your lobby. The game is so hellbent on telling you what’s going on that it can feel like a third of your screen is nothing but text. What’s worse is that these same notifications (as well as phone calls from NPCs) return once more whenever you log in or finish a mission. No, Tony! I don’t want anything you’re selling! And before you ask, nope! There’s no way to turn them off! Hooray for “player choice”!
#8: More Mission Variety
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Rockstar has given us some truly thrilling missions throughout the franchise, but when it comes to GTA, it often feels like we’re doing the same thing over and over again. Sure, we can go rob a bunch of convenience stores, but for what, a couple thousand dollars? Why not break into a millionaire’s home that’s got tight security, or a massive museum filled with priceless artifacts and fossils? Most of what’s already being offered is simply shooting and/or driving, and while there’s enough to keep us busy for a couple of hours, the fatigue sets in rather quickly. At least make the convenience stores different in terms of branding and layouts so it's somewhat replayable!
#7: Environment Diversity
As much as we’ve enjoyed wreaking havoc in settings like Liberty City and Los Santos, the GTA franchise has suffered from a lack of diverse environments. While “GTA V” tried fixing this by including mountainous areas and deserts, most of your time was spent in the city due to the higher concentration of interesting locations. What’s the point of buying a house or arcade in one part of the map when most of the game is on the opposite side? “Red Dead Redemption 2” offered more with its environments by not only including different biomes, but more towns and cities at reasonable distances. GTA VI can implement these improvements, but we’d also like to see a setting that isn’t almost entirely metropolitan.
#6: Mission Hand Holding
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For all the modern open world games out there; Rockstar is currently the only company that insists on having such heavily scripted missions that tell you what to do, every step of the way. It’s a format they introduced with “Grand Theft Auto III” back in 2001, and haven’t really deviated from. Now? It feels archaic compared to its competitors. A year before “Red Dead Redemption 2” was released, “The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild” rewrote the book on Open World Mission Design by prioritizing non-linear exploration. Before that, the Hideo Kojima game: “Metal Gear Solid V” offered various gameplay options to let players decide what the best option was to complete a mission. Rockstar may have pioneered the genre, but their mission booklet is seriously out of date.
#5: Gunplay
When it comes to the gunplay, “GTA V” feels like a massive step backwards for the series. Assuming you haven’t played since the glory days of “Vice City” and “GTA III”, “GTA V” tries to aim for more realistic gunplay, but at the expense of the player experience. Take the reticle, for example. This tiny dot gives very little reference for where your bullets will be firing, and it gives the impression that you need to be extremely precise with your shots. On top of that, there is minimal feedback for spread. It’s not the only game with clunky gunplay, but other such examples, like “The Last of Us”, are much more communicative. GTAV just feels needlessly minimalist.
#4: Grindy Progression
We recognize that some players like to grind, but both “GTA Online” and “Red Dead Online” have become grindy for the dumbest things. Not only do you have to save up enough money to get the thing you want, but oftentimes, you’ll have to reach a specific level requirement to get the OPTION to purchase it. Most of these items don’t even offer a unique feature or upgrade, and so it can be hard to justify the amount of work you need to put in! With missions giving such low payouts, too, we can’t blame those who chose to quit because of this. Gotta sell those microtransactions somehow, right?
#3: Overdone Animations
Rockstar has had a notorious history of striving for realism over...well, everything else. We can understand the desire to make things realistic, but when a game like “Red Dead Redemption 2” is so overly animated, it becomes frustrating to tolerate. We shouldn’t have to watch Arthur take a whopping EIGHT SECONDS to pick up an item!! Yes, we know your animation team is great and can make things realistic, but when you over-animate for the most trivial tasks, it begins to feel overindulgent and like a waste of the player’s time.
#2: Controls
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“Grand Theft Auto V” and “Red Dead Redemption 2” may be some of the best-selling games, but as time has gone on, their controls have become increasingly archaic. Controlling characters is the equivalent to driving a broken tank - wonky, imprecise, and aggravating as hell! If you simply want to turn around, your character will turn around, but walk a couple steps forward in the process. Again, this goes back to over-animating. Aiming isn’t any better, at least for those who prefer to keep auto-aim off and can somehow tolerate the aforementioned miniscule reticle. However, the biggest problem with these controls is so annoying that we need to put it in an entry of its own…
#1: That Damn Run Button!
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This is the biggest nuisance in every one of Rockstar’s games. Why must we repeatedly tap a button to do something as simple as RUNNING??? Not only does this make playing the game feel like a mundane chore, but it’s also annoying as hell to hear our controller repeatedly click and clack! Considering other games make you hold a button, flick an analog stick twice, or click R3 or L3, “GTA” and “Red Dead” start looking outdated. To put this in perspective, the LEGO games have auto-run. AUTO! RUN!! The LEGO games have a better RUNNING system than “Grand Theft Auto” and “Red Dead Redemption 2”! How does that sentence exist!?
