For a game series that derives its name from a term referring to automobile theft, Grand Theft Auto is a franchise that has been placed in high regards of critics and gamers alike. Hailing from back in the days of ‘97, the first Grand Theft Auto game had caused quite a stir with its open world gameplay that was largely centred around the role of a criminal freely roaming vast city robbing banks, assassinating people and a sundry other crimes. The game had received mixed reviews although it was a commercial success on the large.
No matter what had happened with the first game, the series has developed immensely over time and proven its worth with the recent games in the series. Sailing through a flood of praises and critical acclaims, the latest instalment in the series had come to us in September last year. Grand Theft Auto upon its release had even been hailed as the greatest game of the seventh generation of consoles, save the Wii. And there’s the catch. It’s only for the seventh generation consoles, namely the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360. Long have the adopters of the new generation of consoles and PC users been crying foul over this, and it is proper on their part. For there’s a lot that developers can utilise to make the game better on all three platforms.
" The game looked almost immaculate. Save a few things wrong here and there, there was almost nothing that could be put against the game. The game had a great character driven story just like its, predecessor, GTA IV, a vibrant and sprawling city to roam with almost unlimited scope and realism padding along with a beautifully rendered script which has a solid appeal to it and seems appealingly structured. "
The game looked almost immaculate. Save a few things wrong here and there, there was almost nothing that could be put against the game. The game had a great character driven story just like its, predecessor, GTA IV, a vibrant and sprawling city to roam with almost unlimited scope and realism padding along with a beautifully rendered script which has a solid appeal to it and seems appealingly structured.Hands down, GTA V is the largest game that Rockstar North has created till date and they have done a brilliant job if it. It’s not just big, it’s splendid. The developers have taken care to fine tune everything in the world to make it resemble the real world. It had introduced a plethora of new game elements, a triumvirate of awesome protagonists, some polished gunplay and an intricately crafted world.
The developers at Rockstar North had claimed that they had finally learnt to utilise the consoles to the fullest and we’d be damned if they were kidding. The game looked almost immaculate. Save a few things wrong here and there, there was almost nothing that could be put against the game.
The game had a great character driven story like its predecessor, GTA IV, a vibrant and sprawling city to roam with almost unlimited scope and realism padding along a beautifully rendered script which had a solid appeal to it and seemed appealingly structured. These reasons all the more support the rationale behind bringing the game to the new gen consoles and the PC. GTA IV & V alike had pushed the graphical boundaries of the consoles.
The worlds in both the games were humongous and appealing to say the least. You could roam about the world and hardly find things amiss. GTA V had truly pushed the boundaries of console gaming. Even after incorporating so many elements into a game of such titanic proportions, the developers had left no space for complain and dexterously provided the smallest of details to the world.
The visuals looked awesome, the reflections were neat and tidy, so was the bloom and the depth of field just let you sigh in awe. There were half a hundred small things in the game, from your clothes getting wet only where the water touched, your car gleaming a little more when out of a car wash, to situation based mission fail messages, that had you cared to notice, would have ended with you truly admiring the efforts of the developers.
"There has been a lot of apprehension about having GTA V on the PC for many reasons. First and foremost is the system requirements. In light of the PC version of GTA IV - which had pretty high system requirements - GTA V may yet be even more demanding than its previous iteration. But that doesn’t serve as a very acceptable deterrent."
With so much being achieved on the Xbox 360 and the PS3, there’s no telling what the developers can squeeze out of the Xbox One and the PS4. Both the consoles are more than twice as powerful and capable as their forerunners in almost every conceivable way. ‘Almost’, is of essence here but that’s not the point. The massively powerful new microprocessors throbbing in the new consoles can provide a lot of new untrodden ground for the developers.
First and foremost would obviously be the graphical ascension in the game. The Playstation 4 obviously has more shaders than the Xbox One in addition to having a larger number of shaders in the GPU, but that doesn’t mean that the Xbox One is any less capable. Besides, Microsoft has been working on their cloud services to make the Xbox One more capable, although latency could be a bummer.
Both the consoles are still very much capable of churning out 1080p display in 60fps. With ample RAM and powerful processors, both the consoles can easily handle GTA V without breaking a sweat whilst providing us with some serious eye candy.
The same story goes for why the game needs to be on the PC too. The PC market has always been big for the GTA series and it came as a surprise to may when it was announced that the game will only come to the to consoles.
This had caused quite a furore that had manifested itself into a petition that had acquired the signatures of more than half a million people in a short time. But nonetheless, the game hasn’t been ported yet.
There has been a lot of apprehension about having GTA V on the PC for many reasons. First and foremost is the system requirements. In light of the PC version of GTA IV – which had pretty high system requirements – GTA V may yet be even more demanding than its previous iteration. But that doesn’t serve as a very acceptable deterrent.
"Most of the PCs - if not all - are round about as capable as the eighth generation consoles from Sony and Microsoft and hence would be perfectly able to handle games like GTA V. Besides, Rockstar can compromise a little on the system requirements to make the game more accessible to people who don’t really shell out their money for gaming rigs."
The PC market is still flourishing at large. The PC version of GTA IV had featured double the number of players in the multiplayer mode but had suffered a little due to the lack of dedicated servers. Porting the game to the new consoles and the PC with dedicated servers would be a move much appreciated.
There were many a reviews for GTA IV that claimed that the PC version was actually less fun than the console versions. That may have been so but there was this little something that more than covered up the flaws. Modding. Modding practically has endless permutations and combinations to change the game. Sitting in a Lamborghini Veneno looking like ‘V’ from ‘V for Vendetta’ while all the cars around you are flying in swirlies is a different kind of fun after you’re sore with all the roaming, killing, skyscraper jumping and rioting.
There isn’t much that can be compared to clearing away a traffic jam and the denizen of the place by shouting ‘Fus ro Dah’ from the roof of your car. Some modders had been so desperate to get GTA V on the PC that they introduced a mod for GTA IV that can make the game look like GTA V. Of course they only replicated the game’s maps, visuals and mechanics and not the missions. But this just showcases the vast capabilities that modding can have.
Whilst it’s agreed that modding can a butthurt to implement properly, it’s not always the case and once you learn to do it properly, there’s no end to the possibilities of it and besides, there are hundreds of tutorials telling you how to successfully implement mods in games. Console users may argue that they get enough from DLCs but modding open up a whole new world of possibilities and fun. Because consoles don’t allow you to manipulate game elements like modifications let you.
Then again comes the point of graphical fidelity. Most of the PCs – if not all – are round about as capable as the eighth generation consoles from Sony and Microsoft and hence would be perfectly able to handle games like GTA V. Besides, Rockstar can compromise a little on the system requirements to make the game more accessible to people who don’t really shell out their money for gaming rigs.
"With the PC version of course, we will have mods to further our gameplay experience. With unfounded rumours floating about here and there, it’s hard to say what Rockstar is actually planning for the game. But we do know that at the last E3, Rockstart had made a last minute decision to not present 'something'. "
It seems quite a misguided step on part of Rockstar that they would fail to keep up with changing trends. The new consoles may be something that they are ‘slightly’ un-accustomed to but that presents no cause as to not release GTA V on the newer consoles or the PC for that matter. It has almost been half a year since GTA V was launched on the seventh generation consoles and the ardour of PC and the new generation console users has only grown.
With GameStop listing ‘GTA V for PC’ for a short while before taking down the page, people have taken to pushing their demands to introduce the game to the new console generation and the PC even more emphatically.
Introducing the game to these three platforms would allow Rockstar to improve upon their game even more, for example, with dedicated servers, even slicker graphics and smoother performance at higher resolutions and frame rates .
With the PC version of course, we will have mods to further our gameplay experience. With unfounded rumours floating about here and there, it’s hard to say what Rockstar is actually planning for the game. But we do know that at the last E3, Rockstart had made a last minute decision to not present ‘something’.
That ‘something’ could have been the ported/improved version of the Grand Theft Auto V. But we can never be sure. All we can do to allay our doubts and apprehensions, is to wait for the E3 2014 and hope that Rockstar hasn’t forsaken some of its fans.