Monday, September 16, 2013
Grand Theft Auto 5: Features
And there are tons of things players can spend their cash on. Weapons, armour, clothes, masks, car upgrades, custom jobs and properties and businesses are all up for grabs. As was the case with GTA 4, GTA 5 is set on a sprawling map filled with activities to occupy players for ages.
Los Santos is Rockstar’s cracked version of Los Angeles and anyone who has been to the City of Angels will crack a wry smile at the recognisable landmarks and neighbourhoods it contains.
The city is simply bursting with events and mini-games. Players can take part in a round of golf, a game of tennis or even attempt a triathlon. They can improve their aim at a firing range, transport contraband via land or air or engage in a spot of skydiving. Incidentally, each time you use one of the three characters in the game in some sort of activity, you level up their abilities.
If you play a lot of tennis, your stamina will go up. Spend some time at a firing range and your skill in firearms will increase. No activity is a waste and God knows, there’s enough of them to keep players engaged for hours.
The map of Los Santos also feels looser, less claustrophobic than GTA 4’s Liberty City. While we at T3 love 2008’s Rockstar flagship release, we have to confess that the constraints of the Liberty City gridlock prompted us to drop a small fortune on cabs.
This hasn’t been the case in Los Santos; it’s possible to navigate the streets, highways, back roads and off-road routes without taking your foot off the gas and given the beauty and attention to detail of the world around you, driving for extended periods never feels like a chore.
In truth GTA 5 harkens back to the Bacchanalian sense of chaotic freedom that existed in the earliest third-person GTA games (III, Vice City and San Andreas). In Los Santos, you’re restricted only by a lack of attention and your lack of imagination. This is a town where you can enjoy a rollercoaster ride, race down the side of a mountain on a bicycle or buy a parachute, nick a dirt bike and then head off into the hills for a spot of motorised base jumping.
Grand Theft Auto 5: Plot
There’s also a rather decent story underpinning all of this action – even though it will strike fans of the gritty GTA 4 as somewhat more hyper and more deranged. Rockstar North has always presented GTA as a twisted satire on American culture, but given the extreme turn politics and media in the USA have taken in recent years, GTA 5’s satirical edge is sharp enough to sever bone.
The three protagonists at the centre of GTA 5 are all pretty unsympathetic characters, although it’s a testament to how well written they are that they’re not bad company for the 26+ hours it’ll take players to blaze through the main story mode.
Franklyn is a hustler from a rundown area of Los Santos who has grown tired of boosting cars for a repo business and is looking to make his mark as a professional criminal. His job causes him to cross paths with Michael, a retired heist man who is being driven slowly insane by his selfish family.
Franklyn’s looking for a mentor. Michael, even though he initially doesn’t know it, is looking for a protégé and, most importantly, a way to end the mind-numbing tedium of his day-to-day routine. It’s not long before their activities bring them to the attention of Trevor, a violent former partner of Michael’s from back in the day. Once he’s added to the mix everything goes sideways.
