GTA VI Speculation & Discussion - Part ∞ - The Leonida Drought

[Gentlebreeze]

3 minutes ago, Retro_Causality said:

Is this the final countdown?

Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go?

Edited April 28 by Gentlebreeze

[JohnCGaming]

1 minute ago, Gentlebreeze said:

Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go?

and we’ll all go together! (This lyric actually refers to the GTA Forums Jonestown event if we don’t hear anything by May 15)

[Mrki]

There are very few success stories of key creatives leaving established, prestigious studios to start anew, and there's a good reason for that. What actually makes the games by those studios so special isn't the brilliance of any single person, but the collective memory and knowledge gained over the decades and crystallised in that studio's culture. Studios are Ships of Theseus, but as long as the culture remains, the quality remains also. And the vast majority of all these new studios started by individual auteurs will close without ever releasing anything of note, or even anything at all.

[Jason]

Just now, victm92 said:

But basically all of the marketing materials came in the last ~5 months before release. 

 

Furthermore, along with the Rockstar Spouses scandal, a lot of testimonials from employees came out to light, and many of them pointed out similar things. 

 

Both things align well with what we learnt from the legal case. 

 

I'm not saying ALL of its brilliance is due to Benzies, nor that the previous 5+ years of work were non important, but he was probably instrumental to give the final shape of perfection at some degree. 

 

The Rockstar spouses stuff was largely (AFAIK) working conditions, the infamous crunch stuff.

 

The lawsuit emails between Benzies and the Houser's was largely cherry pick puff pieces to make their relevant side look good for the courts. I wouldn't personally read into too much of it, going by what I've read of it my self it seemed like a very personal falling out between people who were once very close. Those type of situations are ones where logic and reason is thrown out the window usually.

 

But simply put, a game that had been in development for something like 6 or 7 years doesn't suddenly go from meh to one of the greatest of all time because one man helped for the last few weeks or so. Benzies obviously is hugely talented and was a key figure in the GTA series who I don't want to undersell, but at the same time I don't think there's any reason to oversell him either. It comes of as the same pre-RDR2 stuff where people expected the game would be sh*te cause Benzies hadn't worked on it, only for RDR2 to be, IMO, R*'s best ever game.

[JohnCGaming]

5 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

 

The lawsuit emails between Benzies and the Houser's was largely cherry pick puff pieces to make their relevant side look good for the courts.

I think it would be best for people to remember this generally whenever there is a very public lawsuit that both sides are trying to work an angle.

[helloworld]

Didn't Obbe Vermeij say that about 80% of the OGs still work at Rockstar?

[deadasdisco]

Contrary to many I think a delay is more likely every week that goes by. What Straussyyy said during the Q&A was aimed at purely shareholders and based on a technicality. Technically what he said is true, they could be aiming for a shorter marketing cycle but it doesn’t rule out a delay - a legal grey area.

Edited April 28 by deadasdisco

[victm92]

31 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

The Rockstar spouses stuff was largely (AFAIK) working conditions, the infamous crunch stuff.

 

The lawsuit emails between Benzies and the Houser's was largely cherry pick puff pieces to make their relevant side look good for the courts. I wouldn't personally read into too much of it, going by what I've read of it my self it seemed like a very personal falling out between people who were once very close. Those type of situations are ones where logic and reason is thrown out the window usually.

 

But simply put, a game that had been in development for something like 6 or 7 years doesn't suddenly go from meh to one of the greatest of all time because one man helped for the last few weeks or so. Benzies obviously is hugely talented and was a key figure in the GTA series who I don't want to undersell, but at the same time I don't think there's any reason to oversell him either. It comes of as the same pre-RDR2 stuff where people expected the game would be sh*te cause Benzies hadn't worked on it, only for RDR2 to be, IMO, R*'s best ever game.

 

It was largely about that but there were insights about other things as well. Check out the original Gamasutra thread. 

 

And yes, I agree with you. It would be plain incorrect to attribute all of Rockstar's greatness to one individual, as it is more like an emergent phenomenon that comes as a result of a collective effort of tons of geniuses and very inspired people in a moment of time, almost like magic - a bunch of small components working together in a perfectly orquestraded dance to produce something greater than the sum of its parts, and something that not even them would know how to explain its existence. That's how I see it. 

 

But still, I reckon Benzies was one of the most instrumental pieces in that machinery. And, to be honest, RDR2 is far from being my favorite Rockstar game. Precisely I would say that I feel that there's something missing on that game that was present in all of their previous titles. You could argue there's merely subjective reasons for me to say that, but that's what I truly felt. 

 

Also, let's keep in mind that Benzies still worked at Rockstar in the first 3 years of development of RDR2, and it's largely built upon the bases that were constructed within his era (with GTAV, RDR1, etc). So it's a bit unfair and imprecise to say that RDR2 is something in which we shouldn't see his fingertips and footprints at all. 

 

But anyways, in reality, all I wanted to say with my first post is that there must be something special and recognisable in Mindseye that probably make it worthy. Maybe it's a bad game and it's plagued at every corner with incompetence and poor design choices, but there must be at least one or two fundamental design choices or technical features that stand out and are special and a sort of geniality. And for that I'm extremely interested and curious about playing the game (unlike other games like Saints Row 2022). 

[met.]

Yesterday I joked that today we would see new information and Rockstar was so angry that someone found out that they pulled 1/3 of Europe into a black out

[TataFamosa]

I forgot that GTA IV turns 17 tomorrow.

 

Do not think that we’ll have news tomorrow eh 

[PolandMountain]

Always look at the bright side guys - some fr*nch people dont have electricity now!

[Jason]

25 minutes ago, helloworld said:

Didn't Obbe Vermeij say that about 80% of the OGs still work at Rockstar?

 

I don't know what Obbe has said him self, but yes AFAIK despite some of the fearmongering about how the vets have all left, there's still a ton of R* vets still at the company, people with well over 10 years of time there, including OG's like Aaron Garbut who is co-head of North.

 

1 minute ago, victm92 said:

Also, let's keep in mind that Benzies still worked at Rockstar in the first 3 years of development of RDR2, and it's largely built upon the bases that were constructed within his era (with GTAV, RDR1, etc). So it's a bit unfair and imprecise to say that RDR2 is something in which we shouldn't see his fingertips and footprints at all. 

 

Benzies took a sabbatical in September 2014 that he never returned from. I don't know the full extent of the RDR2 development timeline but looking at GTA V and the next-gen versions, full development on RDR2 likely started around the time when he took the sabbatical.

 

And while yes R* build on what they've done previously both from a design perspective and technical, it is absolutely wrong to try and put Benzies at the absolute centre of it. As established his role on RDR1 was towards the very end, when the design of RDR1 was virtually entirely established, design which absolutely contributed to GTA V. Just as essential to R*'s success has been people like Dan Houser, the head of R*'s writing for decades, Sam, a creative lead and producer (which was Benzies role along with leading North), Garbut's art etc. Also someone like Rob Nelson who has been at R* since 2005, another producer on games as far back as GTA VI who now co-leads North with Garbut.

 

I've said it many times before when "the Benz!11!" stuff comes up and people try to pin too much on him - the Houser's intentionally stayed out of the spotlight because they wanted the studio to get the credit and not the individuals. The reason people now think Benzies was some god-like figure is because he presented him self as one to try and win a court case - I'm not judging him for this, I don't know the full details of what happened (none of us do) and he might have been genuinely wronged, who knows, it's none of our business really. But if the Houser's wanted to they could've done the same, but that's never been their goal so they didn't. It doesn't mean Benzies on his own was the secret sauce of R*. Key figure, huge part of the games we love, yes, but they're clearly fine without him and on his own he's come out with a platform game that's vanished and a linear AA looking shooter that looks stiff as a board. This is despite an absolute f*ck ton of investment. Meanwhile a 30-50 man team just put out a GoTY contender in Clair Obscur.

[TataFamosa]

5 minutes ago, PolandMountain said:

Always look at the bright side guys - some fr*nch people dont have electricity now!

French ? Yeah, well done for them.

[TheOriginalGunslinger]

5 hours ago, Yoona said:

Remember CJ's lines about the Pope s**tting in the woods? The Pope died 5 months after GTA San Andreas released.

“I told you holmes I don’t know. Why you keep asking me that?”

 

1 hour ago, Spider-Vice said:

Hello from the apocalypse, there's been no power here for the last 3 hours, is GTA VI released yet

 

Fallout 5 has hit early I take it

Edited April 28 by TheOriginalGunslinger

[Agent Edward]

33 minutes ago, victm92 said:

But still, I reckon Benzies was one of the most instrumental pieces in that machinery. And, to be honest, RDR2 is far from being my favorite Rockstar game. Precisely I would say that I feel that there's something missing on that game that was present in all of their previous titles. You could argue there's merely subjective reasons for me to say that, but that's what I truly felt.

I would like to know what reasons made you think this about RDR2, not to criticize you of course, as I have my very own hot takes about this game, even though I still consider it a 9/10.

 

GTA5 still is my favorite Rockstar game though, not RDR2.

 

Edited April 28 by Agent Edward

[REVENGE777]

20 minutes ago, PolandMountain said:

Always look at the bright side guys - some fr*nch people dont have electricity now!

Spidervice is French??

[Agent Edward]

Just now, REVENGE777 said:

Spidervice is French??

Portuguese.

[RaphealPenguin]

If May 15 hits and there’s still nothing, would that kinda-sorta confirm that they really are dragging this drought out until 2/3 months before the release? Or would we be in a “something could happen any day now” situation? 
 

Also, besides the confirmation of the game still being on track for 2025, is there anything else they could mention that’d be extremely good news? 

Edited April 28 by RaphealPenguin

[kahobs]

May will be very exciting month 

[Agent Edward]

6 minutes ago, RaphealPenguin said:

Or are we in a “something could happen any day now” situation?

This one.

 

6 minutes ago, RaphealPenguin said:

Also, besides the confirmation of the game still being on track for 2025, is there anything else they could mention that’d be extremely good news?

Announcing Trailer 2 to be released in the following days.

[Not Strauss Zelnick]

1 hour ago, Retro_Causality said:

Is this the final countdown?

Always has been.

[RIGHT FOR ONCE]

In spite of me being drafted to Team Delayed, 

 

I proclaim that the next cornerstone will be….

 

 

Boxart & Release Date.

 

[Jason]

5 minutes ago, RIGHT FOR ONCE said:

In spite of me being drafted to Team Delayed, 

 

I proclaim that the next cornerstone will be….

 

 

Boxart & Release Date.

 

 

So this probably means the game is not delayed and the next cornerstone will not be info about the box art and the release date.

[The-Ghost]

1 hour ago, Jason said:

 

The Rockstar spouses stuff was largely (AFAIK) working conditions, the infamous crunch stuff.

 

The lawsuit emails between Benzies and the Houser's was largely cherry pick puff pieces to make their relevant side look good for the courts. I wouldn't personally read into too much of it, going by what I've read of it my self it seemed like a very personal falling out between people who were once very close. Those type of situations are ones where logic and reason is thrown out the window usually.

 

But simply put, a game that had been in development for something like 6 or 7 years doesn't suddenly go from meh to one of the greatest of all time because one man helped for the last few weeks or so. Benzies obviously is hugely talented and was a key figure in the GTA series who I don't want to undersell, but at the same time I don't think there's any reason to oversell him either. It comes of as the same pre-RDR2 stuff where people expected the game would be sh*te cause Benzies hadn't worked on it, only for RDR2 to be, IMO, R*'s best ever game.

This man really put up a straight face and found no issues claiming RDR2 was Rockstar's best ever game, when Rockstar's Table Tennis is right there.

[TheOriginalGunslinger]

53 minutes ago, Jason said:

Meanwhile a 30-50 man team just put out a GoTY contender in Clair Obscur.

I’ve been watching some streams and it looks very tempting to be honest

Edited April 28 by TheOriginalGunslinger

[Moonshine Wagon Fan]

4 minutes ago, TheOriginalGunslinger said:

I’ve been watching some streams and it looks very tempting to be honest

 

It's on Game Pass which is excellent.  I downloaded it a few days ago and will play it when I am finished with Vice City.

[TheOriginalGunslinger]

18 minutes ago, The-Ghost said:

This man really put up a straight face and found no issues claiming RDR2 was Rockstar's best ever game, when Rockstar's Table Tennis is right there.

When Rockstar drops Table Tennis 2 all will be right with the world. Now featuring QUAD tournaments!

[Moonshine Wagon Fan]

5 minutes ago, TheOriginalGunslinger said:

When Rockstar drops Table Tennis 2 all will be right with the world. Now featuring QUAD tournaments!

 

I never played Rockstar Table Tennis.

[propanecocaine71]

7 hours ago, Moonshine Wagon Fan said:

 

Speaking of Bethesda, here is my Bethesda collector's editions:

 

 

Very nice collection.

Edited April 28 by propanecocaine71

[TheOriginalGunslinger]

@The-Ghost You see the recent Battlefield Labs leaked stuff? The audio design sounds so good and gunplay looks smooth so far (hopefully). A clip where a heli was shot out of the sky and doesn’t blow up this time was f*cking incredible. It now serves as cover when it goes down in flames and wreckage in that specific area