In some ways, Grand Theft Auto V is a swan song for Sony and Microsoft’s current consoles. Rockstar’s open world adventure game is one of the last blockbuster releases before the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One arrive in November – but it’s also a reminder that next-generation gaming isn’t about swankier graphics or new buttons on a gamepad. True next-generation gaming is about scale, scope and imagination, and by that definition, GTA V is very much a next-gen game.
The good
With Grand Theft Auto V, Rockstar returns to the California-esque setting of San Andreas, reimagined on an truly epic scale. The city of Los Santos and miles of surrounding countryside are yours to explore, in beautiful HD.
Best of all, it’s all available to you from the start: as soon as you can jump in car, you can hit the highway and start exploring, ignoring the story missions for as long as you like (And if you pre-ordered the game, you can even call up a blimp and go on a sightseeing tour). That’s Grand Theft Auto V real next-gen selling point: there’s so much to see and do you might never want to leave. You can play golf or tennis, take flying lessons, even compete in a triathlon. Just sticking the radio on and hitting the coastal road is an experience, where you might get bored of traipsing across a large map in any other game world, and a testament to the studio’s craft.
Grand Theft Auto V is so breathtakingly large that you could easily forget about the single player storyline, though Rockstar’s done its best to make sure that’s unlikely, crafting a winding story and laugh out loud script that takes in three main characters, no less. You can switch between all three on the fly (small time gangster Franklin, retired criminal Michael, clearly modelled on Tony Soprano, and psychopath Trevor), and sometimes you’ll have to in order to complete a mission, which provides an interesting twist on Rockstar’s now finely tuned formula.
The same is true of the controls, which will come as no surprise to gamers – other than slightly tweaked shooting mechanics (drawn from last year’s excellent Max Payne 3) – they’re the same as they ever were. That leaves you to concentrate on taking in everything in the game world around you – and what a world it is.
The bad
You don’t need us to tell you that Grand Theft Auto V is violent – if you’ve ever played a game in the series before, or even picked up a newspaper in the last week, you’ll know this. That may be an issue for you, but that’s also the reason is has an 18 certificate – and it’s not any more gory than previous installments. What is disappointing to see is that GTA V is no less puerile than its predecessors: it’s rude, crude and unpleasantly misogynistic on occasion, and we can’t help but feel Rockstar missed a trick by not making even one of its three leads female this time around.
GTA V is also rather familiar. While the later missions up the ante and then some, there’s an awful lot of ‘go here, steal X or kill Y, return home’ missions early on, which play out in exactly the same way as Grand Theft Auto 3 did 12 years ago.
Even with a glorious soundtrack, that starts to grate. As it stands now, despite its vast scope, Grand Theft Auto V feels remarkably like 2004’s San Andreas, updated for PS3 and Xbox 360. We’d love to see Rockstar branch out a little next time: why, considering the game is developed in Scotland, does Grand Theft Auto always have to be set in a fictionalised US city? It’s great to see Americana rendered in even more impressive detail this time around, but there’s so much potential in moving the series away from the freeways, factories and skyscrapers of the US coast.
The bottom line
Grand Theft Auto V is crass, hyper-violent and sometimes repetitive. And yet, it still excels: this is the most ambitious game world you’ll have ever played in. All of those concerns melt away when you find yourself in the middle of another Michael Bay inspired action set piece, tearing along the highway on the roof of a truck, or even just teeing off on a quiet round of golf. There’s so much to, see, do, explore, jump out of and blow up that it even puts The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim to shame – and that’s all before the multiplayer mode arrives next month. We can’t wait.
