[Obdigore]

Satan, on 19 September 2013 - 04:23 AM, said:

Lot of noise is made over this game, but to me it seems essentially to be the same as the previous ones. Any point looking into if you couldn't get a third of the way through III and IV because of boredom?

Highly doubt it.

[Aptorian]

Satan, on 19 September 2013 - 04:23 AM, said:

Lot of noise is made over this game, but to me it seems essentially to be the same as the previous ones. Any point looking into if you couldn't get a third of the way through III and IV because of boredom?

Yes and no.

GTA V is the same as the last games in that you are (now three) a criminal who needs to make some money, there are weird, scary, funny side characters, insane missions and lots of free roaming. That's probably the most common criticism being levelled at GTA V. That it is just more of the same.

The thing is though, it's very good at what it does. I'm surprised that you are comparing GTA3 and 4 though. Do you mean the original transition to a 3d world or are you also referring to GTA3: San Andreas? Because I really loved San Andreas but thought that GTA4 was way too serious and boring. GTAV is a return to the open world of San Andreas with all its myriad activities and locations and the story is a lot closer to comedy than drama in this game.

Personally, I think you'd love playing through the prologue for Trevor.

[Obdigore]

Ok so question: I love SR3 and 4 because of the comedy and over-the-top shit. The one GTA I played (I don't remember which one) took itself so seriously I never had a good time. Are you implying that the game has a more comedic tilt to it than serious or is it still 'serious game'?

[Traveller]

At what point do you get to switch characters? I've done a few repo missions, races and taken the dog for a walk, but still as playing as Franklin. Early days yet though I guess?

[Aptorian]

Obdigore, on 19 September 2013 - 05:04 AM, said:

Ok so question: I love SR3 and 4 because of the comedy and over-the-top shit. The one GTA I played (I don't remember which one) took itself so seriously I never had a good time. Are you implying that the game has a more comedic tilt to it than serious or is it still 'serious game'?

It's still a serious game but the term serious is sort of skewed in the GTA world. The entire game is satire and social commentary, so every person, every shop, every radio station, etc. are exaggerations of real world America. Making most of your interactions, be they in mission or just in freeroam, absurd and often funny. But the game is not Saints Row, it takes itself seriously enough that most things that happen, while extreme in their violence and mayhem, are still "serious". GTA is like a Michael Bay version of Heat. Saints Row is like a mix of looney toons and "Don't be a menace to south central while drinking your juice in the hood"/Ghetto Blaster.

But the game is a lot lighter in tone than GTA4 mainly because of the difference between the protagonists. Niko Belic was such a depressing human being. The three characters in GTA5 certainly have their own issues, especially Trevor oh boy, but its all told in a more funny way.

Traveller, on 19 September 2013 - 08:29 AM, said:

At what point do you get to switch characters? I've done a few repo missions, races and taken the dog for a walk, but still as playing as Franklin. Early days yet though I guess?

As the story unfolds one storyline leads into the next. Franklins repo missions will end with you coming into contact with Michael. Michaels ... problems, will end up with Trevor getting involved. From there things start to get pretty crazy. I suspect I am somewhere around 33% done with the game and there's still a lot of shit that is going to go wrong.

[Solidsnape]

Kicked a pedestrian in the back last night, and he fell straight into the path of a SUV. It's was priceless.
This game is so funny.

What about that lifeinvader mission where you have to clear the ads from the screen before finding the desktop? There's just tits everywhere!! Haha. It's tooooo good.

[Aptorian]

I've begun to recognize a problem with the main narrative and the side missions in the game in relation to the characters.

I dislike the fact that the characters just "accept" to help out random people out of the apparent goodness of their own heart or in the belief that they will probably get paid later. Basically, these bad guys I am playing let other people walk all over them and they don't seem to expect any compensation. It doesn't fit with their otherwise temperamental and ambitious nature. Trevor I can sort of understand because the guy is insane but for Franklin and Michael the things they are doing make no sense and it frustrates me.

But what really annoys me especially is Michaels whole story arc.

Spoiler

Michael, who was apparently once a quite violent and aggressive person, has turned into a human punching bag. He never stands up for himself, he lets people take advantage of him, both family and strangers, he has no ambition and his family treats him like shit for no apparent reason. Now, during his sessions with the shrink and from some of the insults his wife throws at him, we are supposed to understand that he is actually a terrible man who cheats on his wife and terrorizes his family. Yet, we don't see any of this in the actual story. It appears that Michael is actually impotent (probably from the emasculation of his lifestyle) and he is a very loving father who's affection is not reciprocated by his spoiled family members. Furthermore he seems unable to recognize that his shrink does not care about his well being and is only scamming him for his money.

I hate that. It's really poor characterization when you are told one thing but the actions of the character shows another. Either they should have portrayed Michael as being more of an asshole, for example give him a drinking problem. Or they should have made his family less vicious and self absorbed and constructed a breakdown around Michaels return to robbery and Trevors appearance.

I've reached a point in the storyline where Michaels family has left him and all I can think is good riddance you freeloading parasites. I hope Michael just has a full break down and the game turns into a buddy cop movie with Michael the veteran Bank robber and his partner in crime the loose cannon, Trevor.

This post has been edited by Crustaceous Apt: 19 September 2013 - 03:59 PM

[Illuyankas]

It can't be as bad as the end of San Andreas. Sweet, you ungrateful fuck!

[Aptorian]

Apropos the punches in GTAV

[Jakovasaurus]

Solidsnape, on 19 September 2013 - 09:12 AM, said:

Kicked a pedestrian in the back last night, and he fell straight into the path of a SUV. It's was priceless.

Oh yeah, I shot the pilot of a police helicopter and it crashed into another police helicopter and both went down in glorious destruction on the streets at night. I then used Franklin's elude capabilities and laid low at the airport, driving around on the runways until my wanted level came down. Top that!

[Satan]

Crustaceous Apt, on 19 September 2013 - 04:57 AM, said:

Satan, on 19 September 2013 - 04:23 AM, said:

Lot of noise is made over this game, but to me it seems essentially to be the same as the previous ones. Any point looking into if you couldn't get a third of the way through III and IV because of boredom?

Yes and no.

GTA V is the same as the last games in that you are (now three) a criminal who needs to make some money, there are weird, scary, funny side characters, insane missions and lots of free roaming. That's probably the most common criticism being levelled at GTA V. That it is just more of the same.

The thing is though, it's very good at what it does. I'm surprised that you are comparing GTA3 and 4 though. Do you mean the original transition to a 3d world or are you also referring to GTA3: San Andreas? Because I really loved San Andreas but thought that GTA4 was way too serious and boring. GTAV is a return to the open world of San Andreas with all its myriad activities and locations and the story is a lot closer to comedy than drama in this game.

Personally, I think you'd love playing through the prologue for Trevor.

I admit, I've played GTA IV more than III, but it still boils down to the same thing. The narrative is interesting in and of itself, but it seems completely divorced from the actual gameplay - which is basically go there to pick up that or kill those blokes. If the game was shorter, I might have stuck to it, but the story's so fucking long I just can't be bothered. In the end I was just going through the motions of the mission to see the next video clip. Then, once they upped the difficulty just a tiny bit, I got frustrated and watched a movie instead. The game part of got in the way of the narrative.

[Jakovasaurus]

[Aptorian]

Just got Red Dead Redemptioned by a cougar while out in the country side. I was running up to a car when I suddenly heard the RAWR RAWR sound and fucking cougar pounced on me. It even drew out the same jump scare and feeling of anxiety I'd feel every time I heard a cougar in Red Dead.

[Traveller]

Ha, I know exactly what you mean.I was running into forest to evade some cops - heard the growl, and saw a red dot on the map behind me... I just ran like fuck.

[Aptorian]

I've taken to just blasting any Cougar I see in the wild currently. They started it, I am finishing it.

[Defiance]

Really digging this game so far.

To start, the gameplay doesn't feel divorced from the story. While I enjoyed IV's story, it felt really weird considering Niko was portrayed as a good but conflicted soul. The moment gameplay began, though, you were a mass-murdering psychopath. That was never addressed, which felt odd. In this game, however, it's definitely acknowledged. Hell, when Michael is talking to his therapist early on in the game, he says something like, "I think I just killed someone on the way over here."

Also, the missions have been bloody fantastic so far. GTA always felt like it had a bunch of filler missions, but I haven't gotten that vibe at all in this one. There's always some genuinely hilarious dialogue, and the actual missions themselves have a surprising amount of variety. Gone are the days of repetitive "drive and kill" missions. I think Rockstar has learned to embrace what people enjoy. In fact, I'm pretty sure I read that their inspiration for this game's plot came from how well received the heist mission in IV was. It definitely shows.

[Aptorian]

I agree, this game is much better at meshing gameplay with the characters personalities and lack of ethics.

I do have a problem with Trevor though.

Spoiler

I get that him coming in contact with Michael is actually having a "humanising" effect on him but I don't for a second believe that he would accept the feds ordering him around, especially not with out compensation. At one point he was asking for Brad to be released from jail but he hasn't been pushing the issue.

I think that Trevor would have killed everyone and everything in the room if he was spoken to by the feds like that. Just check out the Rampage missions. The slightest thing can set him off.

[Silencer]

Hmmm. Alright, I'll admit I have not put untold hours into this yet, or anything (just past the first Michael/Franklin quest), but I'm not being blown away. I'm not talking about the fact that it's a GTA game - I knew more or less what to expect on that front - but rather in terms of some of the stuff people have been complimenting to do with the game design in the more technical areas.

The driving feels terrible. It's relatively easy, but it feels clunky and disconnected from the controller. The aiming is similarly overly slow and...hrm...I guess 'awkward'? Not that I'm having trouble hitting things, but it just feels off, somehow.
Meanwhile the graphics are nothing short of disappointing. I've heard comments to the extent of "maybe we don't need next gen yet" about this game's graphics and, frankly, that is absurd. Now, it's been a long while, but I don't think this game is graphically particularly superior to GTAIV, or RDR (though RDR did not have as much to show on screen, granted).

Don't get me wrong. I'm still enjoying the game. But honestly it just doesn't feel stand-out, ten-out-of-ten kind of gaming. OK, fine, I'm coming to this straight off the back of playing Saints Row IV on a high-end gaming PC, with a 5000dpi mouse to aim with, and superpowers which render cars redundant (though I contest that the driving in SRIV was still superior...though comparing it directly is probably not fair, given controller vs mouse+keyboard). I may be setting too high a bar in the graphics and control departments. But it still seems disappointing, in those areas.
And the city doesn't feel as 'alive' as it should. I love the background conversations, I love seeing cars getting pulled over and shootouts happening spontaneously through the city. But I have to feel that I cannot literally get away with murder - the ONLY time I see cops is when they become a never-ending stream of police in pursuit of me, or when they are part of one of those events I just mentioned. Other cars get pulled over for running a stop sign, I can speed from one side of the city to the other through every red light and stop sign, crash into a couple of cars, and pull out a gun and shoot someone, and the cops still never seem to notice.

Granted, the traffic lights in the game are phased too long to make it reasonable to expect me to drive at the speed limit and stop when appropriate (never mind the road layouts...are American lanes even remotely that weirdly laid out? This is putting aside the driving on the wrong side of the wrong thing...), but even so, the lack of police presence and enforcement is...disconcerting.

So yeah. Little negative bits that I've found annoying so far. Not sure whether it's to do with my expectations, or whether my game is different to everyone else's. >.>

[Obdigore]

Silencer, I just want to say that in the graphics department (not having played it myself) there are huge stories floating around saying the PSN download of the game has horrible textures, as does the 360 version if you install the play disc with xbox's installer instead of letting the game do it... so did you do either of those?

[Silencer]

Obdigore, on 21 September 2013 - 10:35 AM, said:

Silencer, I just want to say that in the graphics department (not having played it myself) there are huge stories floating around saying the PSN download of the game has horrible textures, as does the 360 version if you install the play disc with xbox's installer instead of letting the game do it... so did you do either of those?

Nope, PS3 retail disc, which is as far as I can tell a compulsory install?