Last time I played through GTA IV a year or so back I ended the game with almost a half million bucks in my pocket, much of it the score from the bank heist, which felt about right for the story.
In the other games it’s easy to end up with a ton of money early on but IV was a lot more stingy about that stuff.
I think with Sam Houser being president of Rockstar and Dan and Leslie Benzies and everyone else who’s left over the years means he is now the sole driving creative force for the game. This means VI will probably lean heavily into his “simulationist” preferences. “Immersive” is the right word, yeah. Think about how Red Dead 2’s control scheme was more complex than any other game of that scope so you could do authentic cowboy stuff like draw your weapon, cock the hammer manually for each shot so you could do that fanning move you see in western movies where they rapid fire the pistol, manually reload it, then holster it again with a twirl. I won’t be surprised if VI takes things to that level. Maybe that bit from the leaks wasn’t just a developer editor tool and you really will be able to adjust the seat in the car or adjust the mirrors and sun visors for first person driving, in game in real time.
At the very least we’ll probably see gyms return where you can work out and get buff like in San Andreas. All that sort of stuff was Sam Houser pushing for it. There’s all sorts of things to get up to that few people know about. Did you know you can date the strippers in GTA V if you find their profiles on the in-game internet dating site?
And while there is no guarantee anything from the leaks will actually be in the game I think there’s a good chance that the broad strokes stuff on display will still be there. The stuff like in-car third person camera so you can see your character aiming and shooting out the back window or the fact that you can go prone and crawl around on your belly indicates there may be more in depth stealth system at play. Owning small businesses to use as fronts for money laundering gains made from large scores will probably be part of it as well.
But will it be at the same level of detail, or beyond, that they did in Red Dead 2? Will we be walking into gas stations and picking up individual items off shelves and looking at them close up in our hands? Hard to imagine them going to that length given the game world is going to be some order of magnitude larger than the previous games but that level of indulgence is what I’m expecting from them.
Will it be $100? The story mode might be as a one time purchase but Online will probably be a monthly subscription of $15-$20.
Those are my predictions. Can the industry support it? Probably for a time but everything will gradually reorient to a subscription based, pay as you go model. Everyone already has their own subscription service, including Rockstar, so why pay $100 to “own” a digital license to the game when you can just pay $18 a month and get access to it and all their other games? And a physical copy that can be resold? Those will only be available for the ones able and willing to pay premium pricing.
For AAAA gaming it’s probably either that or crash.
