Building Access

[DannyJC13]

So, in the next GTA should all the buildings be accessible??? I think so....

[ScratchCard]

Only the interesting ones such as theaters, cinemas, airport buildings. Having every little appartment and every little box on the hillside accessable makes no sense and only takes up space.

[RomanViking]

If possible, yes. But I'd settle for at least half of the structures enter able.

 

I think it's so cool being able to go inside buildings, and even more so when you can look out the windows at the city.

 

It was lame when Niko's apartment had no windows. They were modeled, but boarded over.

 

I like vast interiors, such as large apartment buildings, each floor and room included, being able to go and out through fire-escapes too

 

Also, working elevators and roof access please. Who wants to climb 70 floors/flights of stairs?

 

[Slingaa]

Only the interesting ones such as theaters, cinemas, airport buildings. Having every little appartment and every little box on the hillside accessable makes no sense and only takes up space.

Took the words right from my keys.

[Asoyfy37]

I already posted such an idea in the ideas topic, have to say that it would be fun to enter any house you want and see the people that live there, even friends.

[DannyJC13]

I want it so when you smack into a building in a helicopter the glass smashes or cracks and when you bail out into a building it smashes or cracks, depending on it's strength.

[Akavari]

i think every building should have breakable windows and store displays should be able to broken into, but only interesting buildings with a purpose should be enterable. There were tons of little apartment complexes in GTA IV but nothing inside them so they were pointless, every building would probably just end up like that if they were all enterable. But I'd like to see more stores, laundromats, banks, fast food joints, pawn shops...just stupid little places that we can have fun in.

[08LasVenturas]

I don't think EVERY building should be accessible. That is nearly impossible & it would take up too much memory. But I think there should be more than there were in GTAIV.

[-RockstarRedCommand-]

Only the interesting ones such as theaters, cinemas, airport buildings. Having every little appartment and every little box on the hillside accessable makes no sense and only takes up space.

It does take up a lot of space, but my ideal gta game would have infinite disk space and no load time and would be 100% real down to every ash of every *sshole taxi driver's cigarette.

[General Goose]

Here's my guidelines:

 

Any interesting businesses (shops, restaurants, police stations, museums, certain offices, garages etc.) should be accessible and in some cases interactive.

All mission buildings.

Certain residences and other commercial property.

 

not every house and flat (well, burglaries outstanding) as that is unrealistic.

 

[ldee]

" All Buildings Should be Accessible ...

Only A Few Buildings can be Entered"

 

Nothing in between?

 

I think that would be the most popular choice, the way it is would fall under "Only a Few", yet it's far too few for me, and "All" would take way too long if R* is to fully render each interior to their full space.

 

I'd say about 10% of buildings accessible (mostly main and interesting buildings) from the current.. 1% or less.

[VickeX]

Depending on how big the map/cities is, i chose "only a few". Maybe 50% of them or so. It's better to have a lot of different looking interiors than loads looking the same. It's nice that you can go in to alot of the buildings in IV. But rather than in the next game making them ALL being enterable and look the same like they do now, i'd rather keep the amount at how many there are now, and make them all different instead.

 

Anybody with me?

[K^2]

As long as the majority of interiors are built from "blocks", it can be easily done. Basically, interior needs to be rendered only if you are inside or really close to a building. Otherwise it goes to the basic exterior model with textured windows. This would result in almost no rendering overhead, and heavy reuse of models and textures for interior would result in very little overhead in disk space required and load on streaming.

 

Most of the interiors would be pretty repetitive and boring this way, but it would at least allow you to get a good vantage point anywhere in the city, as well as give you more opportunities for insertion and exist strategies for missions. It won't add much to the exploration, but it would add to the sandbox aspect considerably. So I'm all for it.

 

As far as making truly unique interiors, current generation of consoles simply couldn't handle it.

[TommyMufc-Champs]

I just think interesting buildings should be accessible.

[ldee]

As long as the majority of interiors are built from "blocks", it can be easily done. Basically, interior needs to be rendered only if you are inside or really close to a building. Otherwise it goes to the basic exterior model with textured windows. This would result in almost no rendering overhead, and heavy reuse of models and textures for interior would result in very little overhead in disk space required and load on streaming.

 

Most of the interiors would be pretty repetitive and boring this way, but it would at least allow you to get a good vantage point anywhere in the city, as well as give you more opportunities for insertion and exist strategies for missions. It won't add much to the exploration, but it would add to the sandbox aspect considerably. So I'm all for it.

 

As far as making truly unique interiors, current generation of consoles simply couldn't handle it.

This.

 

And even we did have such powerful consoles, I bet the workload of fully rendering a unique interior of all 100+ stories of any skyscraper would take as much workload as rendering half of Algonquin outdoors.

 

I can bet very few of us would still be video gamers the day a crime simulating, sandbox game (let's hope it would still be led by GTA) could fully produce a virtual city or town, the size of at least SA, with 100% interior, 100% space (meaning if it's a skyscraper, we are not limited to a large lobby, etc) used and each uniquely created.

 

Heck, it may never even happen.

[K^2]

Oh, it's not THAT bad. A good procedural algorithm can be generating very nice interiors that will be unique in appearance, yet demand relatively little in appearance. And sure, rendering all floors of a single skyscraper would be expensive, but when do you ever need to render all floors? Again, a good optimization routine can cut this down significantly.

 

So we might see this in foreseeable future. Just not on this generation of hardware, and certainly not on this engine.

 

And to reiterate, I would be perfectly happy with simple, repetitive interiors in the mean time. It's better than a city of cardboard boxes pretending to be buildings.

[MattyBoy]

Id say key buildings like airpots cinemas like were mentioned previously.

 

Id also like to see more random quirky interiors, every interior existed for a mission it seemed, it would be nice to see more random interiors that you have to stumble upon.

 

Id also like to see maybe 1 or 2 shops/buildings open per neighbourhood, IMO there was a lack of shops in IV, robbing shops is always fun It would give each neighbourhood more character. For example the laundromat, I know is mission specific, but it was a unique interior, there was no others like it in the game.

Id like to see more random quirky shops like the laundromat not necessarily mission specific either, just to add character.

[visionist]

With IV I would have loved to be able to enter the lobbies of some of Manhattan's famous skyscrapers. The Empire State or Woolworth or Chrysler Building have amazing interiors.

 

 

These are just a few of the most famous. Of course it's hard to imagine a point to going in all these lobbies. Lift access to the roof perhaps?

[El Vlado]

I agree with K^2. Since I first played GTA1, I always wanted to go into the buildings. When I got GTA III, I so wished I could explore the buildings, instead of just have the building and maybe a cutscene. All the way until GTA IV.

 

GTA IV did deliver interiors which was impressive, and so did Vice City and San Andreas to a limited extent. But in the next GTA, I'd love to see as much interior as possible, a dream that has been for many GTA fans. It isn't that hard to create neither, all you have to do is make say 200 different interiors for rooms, then repeat them. Yeh people will complain, but who cares? I mean seriously, having so much depth into the game would be amazing, one would feel compelled to visit every room (which would be impossible). Not to mention the sniper positions that you would have, and the fun of having firefights throughout every building! Add random pedestrians sitting, sleeping, watching tv, etc, as well as awesome exterior, you have a living breathing city in every facet. Remember, many of the major achievements that exist today in terms of gaming only are such because it began with a small but smart idea

 

Being able to enter all stores and shops, laundromats, business, etc would make a whole lot of a difference in terms of gameplay, and the feel of the game. The size of the game definately should be the same as GTA IV, but in terms of scope it can be really indepth, even on this generation of technology.

 

Unfortunately even though if this is possible, I doubt it will occur. My pessimism comes from the fact that Rockstar's primary objective is monetary gain, not to make it impressively deep

Edited November 3, 2009 by El Vlado

[Akavari]

if every building had an interior they would be cookie-cutter layouts and you'd see the same interior in every 3 buildings

[El Vlado]

 

if every building had an interior they would be cookie-cutter layouts and you'd see the same interior in every 3 buildings

You're presuming that they wouldn't be bothered and slap together a few pixels here and there to make interiors... It isn't 2003 anymore. People demand more from digital entertainment then ever before, because we have high technology nowadays.

[DannyJC13]

I enjoyed going into Super Markets in Vice City Stories.... I wish they'd bring lots of those back. And the ability to rob the store like in Saints Row 2.... I know you can do it in VCS and GTA IV but it isn't as fun.....

[Mafio$o]

I think all buildings should be accessible, but only its lobbies and lifts can be visited - rooms or flats cant be entered. Also all shops, cafes, malls, museums and roofs of buildings should be accessible.

[Wolfmight]

Asking for all buildings accessible is a large request. Some should be locked from time to time and some should require a B&E to get inside - i.e. using the window or picking the lock (mini-game dialog). Even 70%+ accessible is pretty awesome!

Edited November 10, 2009 by Wolfmight