Welcome back to a new episode of Hot Topic. I'm Gary 7MT for the GTA Series Videos official crew
and as in our first video, if you want subtitles, click on the captions button.
In this video we want to revisit GTA 5 and GTA Online, but this time with a focus on the next release of the game for PS4, Xbox One and PC.
First of all there's a question to answer: why has Rockstar Games developed such a huge game like GTA 5 for old gen consoles?
The answer was given by Dan Houser himself in a couple of interviews back in 2012 and to make a long story short,
his reason is those platforms have a "much larger audience".
It is a fact that there are many more PS3s and Xbox 360s in the gamers' houses than PS4s and Xbox Ones.
Rockstar Games has never excluded PS4, Xbox One and PC releases, but declared:
"We are currently focused on the Xbox and PS3 versions of the game and don't have any details to share about PC or next gen versions at this time".
Now if one reads between the lines you understand that this statement isn't denying future releases on other platforms.
There are just a few titles that right now are and will continue to be console exclusive.
We're of course talking about GTA Liberty City Stories
GTA Vice City Stories
GTA Chinatown Wars
The Midnight Club series
The Warriors
and Red Dead Redemption.
But for now let's kill the talk about other Rockstar Games titles, and focus on the GTA series.
At the last E3 Sony Conference, GTA 5 was announced for PS4, Xbox One and PC through a trailer that showed how much the graphics have been improved,
allowing for a beautifully enhanced and richer Los Santos and Blaine County.
To make the differences clearer, in the past months we made a trailer comparison by recreating the PS4 trailer using the PS3 version of GTA 5.
We can see more people around the city, new animals like this cat...
... and these hammerhead sharks.
This probably means more wildlife, maybe even the bears mentioned in GTA 5 and seen in Red Dead Redemption.
Also on the new gen and PC announcement trailer we saw a fully functional speedometer inside the car
that could lead to the possibility of having a first person view in the game that fans have been begging for for years.
But let's go back to the new console and PC announcement and focus on what happened a few days later.
Stephen Totilo from Kotaku.com had an interview with PlayStation's Marketing VP John Koller who hinted at exclusive content in the PS4 version of GTA 5.
Clearly these possible exclusives won't be the GTA 5 story DLC or the GTA Online Heists DLC
due to the fact that this content was already announced by Rockstar Games when the game was only available on PS3 and Xbox 360.
In other words, a previously announced piece of content cannot become a new gen console or PC exclusive.
At the same time, this content won't just be available on old gen consoles.
Rockstar Games will surely release all these DLCs to all the published platform versions of the game.
Anyway, such content could be a temporary exclusive - first released on a single or a selection of platforms and then after a few months on all the other platforms.
But let's move on to what we know we're gonna get.
Now based on what Rockstar announced, the game will take full advantage of the new platforms to increase both graphic and technical aspects of the game
to deliver a whole new and improved level of ass-kicking realism and detail.
GTA Online players will also get the new gen and PC treatment with more properties, vehicles, weapons, player customizations and
- thanks to the Rockstar Games Social Club features - will have the option for a one time only transfer
of their GTA Online characters and progressions from the current platform to their choice of PlayStation 4, Xbox One or PC. So choose wisely!
Also, exclusively for the PC version of GTA 5, Rockstar Games announced the newly designed video editor.
Like the one already available in GTA 4, the editor allows users to create their own, personal, custom videos and even entire movies.
Which in turn leads us to another aspect of the PC release of GTA 5.
Players who waited an eternity for the release of GTA 4 for PC, had their expectations dashed
by receiving an extremely unstable game that even the most powerful PCs failed to run.
This forced Steam to offer, case by case, a refund to angry gamers who were well above the system recommendations
but still unable to run the game even at the lowest possible settings.
To their credit, after a few patches and tweaks, the PC version of GTA 4 has gotten better by the week.
After what happened with the PC version of GTA 4, this kind of fiasco being repeated is highly unlikely with GTA 5.
This is because Rockstar has changed their methods and taken the PC porting responsibilities
from the Rockstar Toronto team and given them to the Rockstar Leeds team.
Gladly the results are easily seen through the PC version of L.A. Noire in which the game ran pretty well from day one.
Continuing on the PC platform, one of the main characteristics of GTAs on PC is modding.
Thanks to bigger and smaller modders who release new skins for vehicles, tools, scripts and even total conversions
that alter the entire game world, all the previous GTAs on PC are still living, breathing creatures.
While modding is undeniably one of the dopest things about GTA on a PC, it could - at the same time - lead to big problems with multiplayer gaming.
We've already seen how active the modding community has been on GTA Online on consoles
and even if they feel their mods are fun and harmless, others can be a huge pain in the ass and just chases gamers away from GTA Online.
So the question is, how can Rockstar stem the noxious tide of mods on GTA Online?
Honestly we have no freaking idea, but maybe the only way to definitely put a stop to all the modding would be an extensive re-writing
of the all the game scripts and codes rendering all hacks, trainers and mods useless.
But this would take intense and costly man hours - and because of that, is highly unlikely. I mean, who wants to re-write all this shit?
So, to recap: we've learned that we'll get new animals, people and cars on top of a stunning new level of detail in the new gen and PC versions of the game.
We'll be able to move our GTA Online characters from our current platform to a new one of our choosing.
We also learned that an already announced content won't be exclusive content for a new version of the game
and finally that even if the GTA 4 PC porting was a hot mess, this won't be the fate of the GTA 5 PC versions.
Before we get to your best questions, comments and ideas, we want to say that at the moment we have no clue
about the exact release date for the PS4, Xbox One or PC version of GTA 5.
Only Rockstar Games has that information and right now maybe they aren't even sure about it.
While they did announce a release window, and put out a trailer, they're mum on all other info.
Since that announcement nothing has been released. Not even a lousy screenshot!
Added to the fact that we closing in on fall, we wouldn't be surprised if in the coming weeks Rockstar announces a delay
moving the release from the end of 2014 to the first quarter of 2015.
From Jerry Meisler and other users on YouTube comes the idea that Zombie DLC with Michael could be tied to a movie he's making with Solomon Richards
Now, this is a good idea and could really link Michael to the zombies without using clichés or some other dumb reason.
It might even be a remake of the "Vinewood Zombie" movie
- a classic produced in 1981 by Richard Majestic according to the in-game website ClassicVinewood.com.
Also tied to this movie is the street artist, "Graham", who is always found on the corner of Vinewood Boulevard cosplaying the main zombie from that movie.
Again from YouTube: "How about a Los Santos story explaining Lamar's life or mabye Lester or the dude that Trevor works with".
Not bad at all, and it could also be tied to the "City Stories" brand that Take-Two recently placed a copyright on
probably to just preserve both Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories.
But yes, it could be fun to have three new main characters directly tied to Franklin, Michael and Trevor.
From Facebook comes a request for breaking, entering and theft in GTA Online.
To steal what? Whisky?
Matt at Google+ is still waiting for a GTA game or a DLC with a female protagonist and wonders if maybe they'll do it in a Red Dead game.
We're waiting for that too and maybe it could be a groundbreaking change that Rockstar Games could use after bringing the "3 main characters" feature in GTA 5.
But still, before that, we think a new Red Dead game with Landon Ricketts instead of a female protagonist would be much better received.
Sorry ladies, but that guy has a history we really want to see.
YouTubers ask what about NOS, with hydraulics and making own car livery like in Midnight Club LA as a DLC.
We already saw NOS and hydraulics in GTA.
They could both be good additions to GTA Online also because apparently there will be no new Midnight Club now or anytime in the future.
But we'll talk about that on a new episode of Hot Topic that'll focus on what future games may be in the pipeline from R* and which ones probably won't.
Dimitri from Facebook wants the Stallion back.
You know what? We would love that too, it's the car we chose to use years ago for our logo. C'mon Rockstar, bring it back!
Ives at Google+ asks about a DLC with San Fierro and Las Venturas.
Pretty awesome, but also highly unlikely.
We can expect new interiors, but we don't think that a whole new city or more could be part of a future DLC. Why? It's just too big, even to download it.
Mullroy at YouTube likes how everyone is bitching about Heists and DLC's not being released fast enough, while he just wants GTA 5 on PC.
Fuckin' A.
Finally from Google+ is a comment on the frequency of releases theorizing that Rockstar doesn't release them often enough because of the glitchers and leakers.
You know, honestly we don't think Rockstar holds back on release patches and DLC.
Why? Well, because in ten months - starting last October, when GTA Online was released - we had 16 patches and 7 totally free DLCs.
Practically without spending a single cent, we had an update almost every 20 days and new content every 40.
Even with all the mods, glitches, cheaters and other troublemakers, they're still treating us more than well we think.
Well, that just about does it for this installment of Hot Topic, this was G7 with the GTA Series Videos crew.
Stay tuned for all the latest news and videos and we'll see you next time.