General Map Discussion

[Mister Pink]

General Map Discussion

 

Lately, I've been enjoying the idea of a more dense city. For example, there's more interiors, more interaction with the environment, subway network, sewer network, vents to climb through, climbable drainpipes, hidden rooms, pedestrians that do more activities other than smoke or look at their phone (ok, I'm being fictitious, I know peds do way more than just smoke or go on their phone ) . In these environments, being on foot can be very rewarding. Missions can be approached in a wealth of ways using that are very satisfying, possibly by using stealth, climbing or longer detailed shootouts or hand to hand combat due to the more technical and interactive nature of the city. All this requires demands computer power and resources. In the GTA series, IV might be more akin to this or another open-world game that may relate to this would be Sleeping Dogs and a more linear but free-roam example, Deus Ex.

 

On the contrary, I enjoy variety in maps. I loved San Andreas for it's scope and size. I loved the idea of 3 cities and traversing between them, enjoying the countryside and desert in between. They also had a lot of interiors from police stations, casinos, restaurants, houses, gyms etc. It has been argued that you can't have a dense, detailed city or cities and have a big expansive map too.

 

My First Question..

 

Can we see a GTA with multiple cities that doesn't compromise on a high level of detail in the cities? My dream is a GTA that we have a GTA with multiple cities again. However, I'm enjoying games like Deus Ex, Sleeping Dogs a bit more these days for the level of exploration (using vents to sneak around/hacking and stealth) and hand to hand combat respective of those games.

 

Can we see a GTA with a good level of "depth" (stealth, interiors etc) as well as having a varied and expansive map on during this generation?

Edited July 5, 2016 by Mister Pink

[Maxxeine]

Considering processing power is constantly progressing, and storage spaces are getting larger, as well as components becoming more affordable, seeing a GTA that truly doesn't compromise detail in favor of quantity may not be that challenging. While I do agree that maintaining a "balance" is crucial to executing a successful final product, maintaining this balance over a larger scale is and definitely will be possible in the near future.

 

RAGE is constantly expanding, so it's no surprise that we'd see GTAN take advantage of newer hardware to propel the engine's capabilities further.

 

I think the main reason V felt so empty was because of the fact that it had to be released for the 7th gen consoles, as well as 8th gen and PC. This hindered performance severely, and we may have received a more detailed V as a result. This argument is debatable however.

 

Rockstar loves to break boundaries, so if GTA will ever receive the same amount of detail that IV had, while maintaining the travel aspect of San Andreas, GTA Next will be the first game to do that for the series.

[Mister Pink]

I wouldn't be well versed on computer processing capabilities only in the layman's capacity but what you write sounds reasonable and gives me hope.

 

The only other issue is, do Rockstar want to go this way? Maybe it's not their priorty to build cities like that. It seemed like that for IV when there was talk of using the trunk, climbing poles and I think I remember Houser saying something about utilizing the verticality of Liberty City, which I never really seen. Maybe he was just referring to the lower-camera angle of to give you more view of the skyscrapers and I misconstrued it as using more elevators, roof-tops, ladders etc.

 

Even a crawl feature when nativating the environment could add to the game play in ways I can't imagine yet but so far we V seems spread a little thin? Although it does contain huge detail in other subtle ways.

Edited May 24, 2016 by Mister Pink

[Fuzzknuckles]

 

The question:

 

Can we see a GTA with multiple cities that doesn't compromise on a high level of detail in the cities? My dream is a GTA that we have a GTA with multiple cities again. However, I'm enjoying games like Deus Ex, Sleeping Dogs a bit more these days for the level of exploration (using vents to sneak around/hacking and stealth) and hand to hand combat respective of those games.

 

Can we see a GTA with a good level of "depth" (stealth, interiors etc) as well as having a varied and expansive map on during this generation?

Of course, but maybe not on the current generation. Next? Maybe.

 

Ideally, for me, the map would be roughly the same sort of size as we had in V, but with a bunch more interiors. A litle more variety in the neighbourhoods for balance would be great, too. But other than that, I don't think the V map really got anything wrong. Sure, there weren't many interiors (though there were quite a few) but that didn't really bother me. I'd rather, like V, we had a selection of great interiors and semi-interiors (like the Bug Star depot) than a load of cookie cutter, empty, dull interiors like we had in SA. IV's interiors were good, but again, too many buildings that were too similar. I liked the idea of being able to get to the rooftops from certain buildings, but found the empty stair wells... well, empty.

 

I can't imagine a GTA without countryside, so while I think it'd be good to expand the city a little and flesh it out with a little more variety, the countryside can't suffer as a result of that expansion. You need the different terrains to freshen things up. When M and T head out to Blaine County to lay low, it really felt like a new chapter, and it felt like there was a real reason to be somewhere else, which felt like an entirely different location.

[Mister Pink]

I would be pushing for multiple cities, heck even if there's one other sizable city to give more sense of traversing the map from end to end or airport to airport and for reasons of variety - maybe as you describe as a sort variety in neighbourhoods but variety in cities, given the cities are distinctly different, with different peds, cars weather and "atmosphere." For example, one city can be suffering from economic and social issues (maybe like Detroit) and the other more prosperous and affluent.

 

Good points on the "cookie cutter" interiors. When assuming or imagining there'll be more interiors for GTAN, it might be reasonable to assume that Rockstar wouldn't do the copy & paste stuff like they did in SA, more than 12 years ago. As seen in V, I think every road looks unique with different cracks, tar and where the road was worked on etc. I don't think we would need to worry about that. However, I'm not sure that would take up much space or computer power, or am I wrong? Even if it was purchasable properties, each having a unique interior.

 

Countryside is a must. It's yang to the yin of a bustling city. I'm not sure it should ever go away.

 

What if Rockstar did go the way of IV and just made a concrete island city like in IV again? That was kind of a big surprise and disappointment about IV for me (as much as I love it for all the other reasons it's great). I can't fathom GTA without the picturesque scenery and the feeling of entering a city coming from the country or being bored of the city and that refreshing feeling (almost like real life) when you leave a concrete jungle for the peace and tranquility of the countryside.

 

I just hope we can have an advaced level of depth that people would akin to IV's Liberty City and keep expanding the map where we can have two of those cities and country side. It might be too much to ask though but like The7thOne said, Rockstar likes to break boundaries.

 

When I seen V's map, I thought it was reasonable and generous (in terms of size). I was happy and excited but it was the minimum/maximum I expected in a new GTA game on last gen. I've yet to be wowed like I was when I saw S.A.'s map when I pulled it out of the box for the first time (in terms of size and going from 1 city to 3.. Then again, it was the first time we got towns and countryside as well as a map and ocean to explore. Maybe I'll never get that wow factor again. Maybe we wont see a leap like that again in that respect. The leaps are coming in other more subtle ways.

Edited May 24, 2016 by Mister Pink

[Fuzzknuckles]

I think one way R* could achieve the same Wow factor of SA is if they stick to one type of terrain, I guess the standard "countryside" of fields farms and forests and do away with mountains altogether, so that the user has a consistent terrain to drive through for a long time before happening on another settlement or city. V does quite well at tricking the player into feeling like they're driving further than they really are, depending on the route you take (for example, going from Vespucci beach to Richman, then through the hills to the Salton Sea, then on up North via the freeway). San An did this quite well too but the lack of anything to really look at other than the giant boob, Chiliad, made it feel empty. I guess it really benefited from such short draw distance as you were never really sure what was ahead when you drove somewhere new for the first time. That false sense of scale was completely gone for me by the time I reached LV, I'd realised that the length of the drives was sort of an illusion thanks to some tricky little curved roads.

 

So I guess what I'm saying is that if they kept us in one simple, sprawling land mass that stretched for miles and miles, but was full of little places here and there, eventually leading to a second city of roughly the same size as the first, would be pretty much spot on. I'd miss the mountains and desert, though for anywhere other than LC that's not really appropriate anyway.

 

If they were to go with VC next and give us miles and miles of sprawling wetlands and marshes and two distant cities they could achieve something close to reality. But finding enough compelling stuff to put in the vast bit of land between the two cities would be difficult, and I feel the marshy-swampy area in V is pretty much the weakest area of Blaine County, so it might not be much fun to actually be there.

 

Other than a similar land mass to V's I can't think of how they'd give LC a satisfying country area, that didn't feel wrong. I seriously doubt we'll ever get a concrete island set up ever again, though.

[Maibatsu545]

Maybe some day, as technology gets better. Maybe by the mid 2020s and that's a big maybe. Until then I wouldn't get my hopes up. I'd put up with a smaller map if every building was accessible, even if they have generic interiors.

Edited May 24, 2016 by Maibatsu545

[Fuzzknuckles]

I think it'll be much sooner than that. I can see this generation of consoles (and therefore console ports) being much shorter than the last, as the tech in the consoles isn't as expensive or as specific (and difficult to work with) as last time around, so it'll be more of a race to get a more powerful machine out first for the next gen. I'm guessing as early as 2019, maybe 2020. Barely enough time to get a proper collection of games together.

[Rhoda]

I agree that we'll see the technology sooner rather than later, I'd put money on it that we'll see a new console from one of the big boys by 2018/2019. Nintendo are already well on the way to developing a new console by the name of NX, due for release halfway through next year. I know that's not exactly the point, but for the last eight or so years Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft have usually been level with each other when it comes to console development, barring a few release hiccups.

 

Anyway, I think it's not completely beyond the capabilities of current generation consoles to further expand a city upwards as well as outwards. I wouldn't be surprised to see another city alongside the primary setting of GTA 6. While it's a fool's game to compare prior releases to what's coming up, the leap between 3D generation instalments was impressive in terms of scope and scale.

[Maibatsu545]

I agree that we'll see the technology sooner rather than later, I'd put money on it that we'll see a new console from one of the big boys by 2018/2019. Nintendo are already well on the way to developing a new console by the name of NX, due for release halfway through next year. I know that's not exactly the point, but for the last eight or so years Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft have usually been level with each other when it comes to console development, barring a few release hiccups.

 

Anyway, I think it's not completely beyond the capabilities of current generation consoles to further expand a city upwards as well as outwards. I wouldn't be surprised to see another city alongside the primary setting of GTA 6. While it's a fool's game to compare prior releases to what's coming up, the leap between 3D generation instalments was impressive in terms of scope and scale.

I hope so. It would be great if they do Vice next that we can go to the Everglades or key west/the islands. That's one of the things I love about the scarface game

[Pink Pineapple]

I think it'll be much sooner than that. I can see this generation of consoles (and therefore console ports) being much shorter than the last, as the tech in the consoles isn't as expensive or as specific (and difficult to work with) as last time around, so it'll be more of a race to get a more powerful machine out first for the next gen. I'm guessing as early as 2019, maybe 2020. Barely enough time to get a proper collection of games together.

 

I'm wondering if that has anything to do with lack of SP DLC for V. If this console generation is going to be short, then they don't have much time to get GTA VI finished and ready to be released on current gen. There's no way they're going to go an entire generation without a new GTA. Maybe they realized there wasn't enough time to complete both so they scrapped the DLC.

[dyspoid]

I would like both, but it doesn't really matter unless they implement it well.

 

The story mode needs to include larger sections of the city to paint them with character. It could be a huge map, but it would still feel miniscule unless story missions involved more than just a selection of neighbourhoods. This was one of my peeves about V, and I have only just noticed it in SA after doing another play through. So much space just isn't used.

 

IV feels bigger to me - purely because of the fact that we had three storylines taking place in almost every corner of the city. It gave streets purpose, characterised certain areas and altogether made for a more complete experience.

 

I would enjoy a map the size of V, with the density features that you mentioned.

[kraftwerkd]

My whole thought process is seeing as PS3/X360 are pretty much no longer relevant for developers, the devs have a lot more raw power at their disposal to work with. I think this is why GTA V was the way it was - they had to compensate for the lowest common system they were developing for. Now that technology has increased by a decent amount, the devs can push for fuller and larger worlds, with more interaction and life.

 

A map twice or triple the size of V, with like five cities that are just as dense as LC but with some more interiors, would be great. I'm convinced LC is much bigger than Los Santos, but I've been too lazy to actually prove or verify that. But a map that size, with nice long stretches of freeway, huge forested areas, a few areas like Paleto and Harmony dotted in between. I'm sure the newer consoles are able to handle that, as we've seen what limits R* is capable of pushing hardware to. PC isn't an issue, but everyone's gotta have a fair chance.

Edited May 25, 2016 by kraftwerkd

[Jabalous]

The more processing power provided by the current consoles will allow Rockstar to present more realistic worlds visually and behaviorally. However, burdens of development will increase as they're now committed to model, texture and define the world's behavior in more fine details than before. Not only it will cost more to produce a game this time, but it will take more bandwidth to do so and eventually there will be a larger gap than before between each new game from Rockstar, and we are already seeing this happening. For these reasons, the chance they would make multiple-cities Grand Theft Auto is almost null.

[gtamann123]

I would go for a denser, more detailed city. Particularly in a period piece GTA set in the 1970s. MAKE IT HAPPEN R*

[Triple Vacuum Seal]

It largely depends on the setting of the game. Even the big US cities aren’t very densely populated once you get outside of the inner city. Having multiple cities wouldn’t hamper the amount of interiors per se. It would just make them more dispersed. Though they clearly have to focus on the middle ground between size and detail, we can have both.

 

R* aims to recreate the American urban experience. The problem with limiting the map to one city is that we lose one of the most iconic aspects of that experience. We lose the ability to travel between culturally distinct cities by car on the interstate highway system. They were really onto something in SA. If I remember correctly, traveling between cities never got old. No amount of rural airstrips is going to explain away the single airport problem either.

 

A single city would be undesirable on current gen machines unless we saw an extensive use of inner city office interiors and enterable residential units ranging from single family homes in the suburbs to urban apartments all w/ some degree of NPC activity. Otherwise, the replay value will suffer. And if R* wants to take longer time intervals between releases, then the importance of replay value will only increase. With that said, we’ve never been given a bad map.

[gtamann123]

I don't want multiple cities in the next GTA I would personally rather see them focus on one city. With a sprawling size surrounded by suburbs. Plus a very large amount of desnity and interiors both in the inner city and suburbs.

[Mister Pink]

That's sounds good and all but I really do like having multiple cities for variety. The variety gives the game a longevity I can't find in other games. I love the notion of traversing between the two. Remember in RDR where you cross the border in to Mexico for the first time? I feel like that travelling between cities. I find it purposeful, airports have a better meaning, highways the lead to other places is great.

[Not A Nice Person]

With help from Current Gen machines they can obviously undertake this challenge, with a bit of creative talent they've been lacking as of V imo VI can be one of the best maps.

[PhillBellic]

I can only hope the overall Map gets larger, denser, and more detailed.

 

So the Map would be like SA's, but on Steroids.

[thatstupidbug]

I'll be honest... i would happily accept a map the size of gta III if EVERY shop/house is enterable...

 

Ok, "every" is an hyperbole, but i want to interact with the world and feels like a part of it, not an actor wandering in a fake stage

[RogerWho]

People often think problems like these are technology-based but that's not the biggest hurdle. Yea, the engine may have limitations or maybe the programmers may not be up to the task of enhancing the engine, but worst case scenario you can always add loading screen when entering a large interior or when moving to another part of the map (e.g. like in V, you can't move freely from LS to North Yankton).

 

When it comes to the engine, the biggest limitation is visibility, but that can be dealt with. I'd bet the reason the Mount Chiliad is so huge is to limit visibility from one end of the map to the other. The Algonquin cityline in IV serves the same purpose. Visibility-limiting tricks have been around since Doom although in a somewhat different manner. If you know how to limit the visibility, your engine can handle coordinates of a large map and the trash collection is good so that the game won't crash after traversing the map a couple times, then in theory you can have infinite detail on an infinitely large area. In terms of storage, only the X360 was severely limiting with its DVD format.

 

Nah, the biggest hurdle is to have enough people and time to create all the content, and the money to pay them. Neither is a problem for a company like R*, the question is whether they'd want to invest in a project like that. Remember that in terms of area, if you make a map twice as large (in both dimensions), you need to make 4x times the content. If you'd want to add a lot of unique interiors, you can probably double that right away, and that's not mentioning adding small detail bits that are expected with every enhancement. Then you probably want to expand the story appropriately so that the whole map is utilized, so that comes with its own hurdles. And sure, if you expand the contents so much, you'll definitely also have some tech problems to deal with. So at the end you have a map twice as big and you put 10x as much work into it.

 

Frankly I've always been amazed by open-world games and how much fluff they have to have by design. Corridor shooters and other limited-experience games are relatively simple, you create the content on the path of where the player is going, but with open worlds you actually need to create the world with a lot more content as the game would necessarily require otherwise. But I'm glad it's being done and companies are up to the challenge.

[Mister Pink]

Are you saying the visibility as in the computer having to generate so much content at one go? For example, I always thought fog and smog were a good used not only for aesthetic purposes but for the functionality of computer-processing.

 

I found San Andreas' map was fantastic for this. The roads were very windy in the countryside with hills and visual obstacles such as trees and rock (a lot of the roads were like they were cut in to the hillside with massive trees towering above you, often the trees felt like you could hide there and that they offered some sort of protection, especially from helicopters.

 

 

I liked this as it gave me a feeling of being able to get lost easier. As apposed to V's map that's a big "oval" shape and bordered by hills and then at the bottom of that oval, city, divided by hills between the two.

 

I think I know why this was done. Within the oval, every direction you look, there's a nice mountainous and/or hilly vista. This is obviously very purpose full as the draw distance now exceeds map size. Or in other-words draw distance/map size ratio in unbalanced now. We can now see farther and with more clarity, yet the map/island isn't very long/far. Strategically having hills and mountains bordering the map gives us a backdrop instead of the sea, reminding you that the map ends and you are on an island. It also makes for fantastic scenery wherever you look.

 

While that's smart thinking on Rockstars side, the downside is, navigationally speaking, I have the feeling that I always know where I am, reinforcing the feeling that the map isn't that big or "endless." Coupled with the use of GPS in the cars, there's a sort of feeling that I'm never really lost in a big world. Also, once inside the oval, the land is relatively flat. There's not much obscuring hills or valleys within valleys sort of environment. I can stand anywhere in the oval and point towards a mountain or hill and pinpoint where I am.

 

In San Andreas they had these winding roads that would really throw off your sense of direction. You may also be "punished" by trying to take a short-cut through some countryside as you may come across a cliff with a river. This left little chunks of countryside that felt isolated.

 

I hope we can see more places, under the trees, beneath the fog out in the country that feel more isolated and genuinely spooky.

I hope we have a more obscured countryside again like in San Andreas, designed to confuse and give a sense of being lost without many massive landmarks to give away your location.

 

I think about GTA too much.

Edited June 29, 2016 by Mister Pink

[PhillBellic]

 

I think about GTA too much.

There's nothing wrong with that.

 

I often enjoy reading your Posts and wonder if some of them will become Ideas in future GTA Titles.

[Mister Pink]

 

 

I think about GTA too much.

There's nothing wrong with that.

 

I often enjoy reading your Posts and wonder if some of them will become Ideas in future GTA Titles.

 

 

Thanks man. The feeling is mutual.

[RogerWho]

There are certainly both technical and world-building reasons why you want to limit visibility. The most well-known example is Silent Hill 2, which had tons of fog because the PS2 couldn't cope with their sh*tty engine so they had to limit the viewing distance, which also gave the game its atmosphere. When they removed the fog in the PS3 (or 4? not sure) re-release, the game lost its magic, or so I heard.

 

Having huge viewing distance on a ground level logically means you don't have a lot of detail in the map. Imagine a desert - you can see far into the distance, but there isn't much to see. Like the desert areas on LS in V.

 

As soon as you're in a forest or even a sparse village, you have vertical detail that also necessarily limits your visibility, which helps the engine deal with said detail, like in the dense city areas, or in the case of SA, the hillside with the trees.

 

One issue (or so I imagine) is that creating natural detail like hills and trees is more taxing. Before the HD era games (not just GTA but overall), you use a couple of polygons to make a tree and nobody would expect it to look better, but today, making the things that come from nature generally require a lot more detail than human-made objects. However, there are tons of techniques and middleware to help with such tasks, and a lot of game dev teams tackle it quite fine (see the Witcher games and the Tolkien-esque fantasy games which occur outside in the country) so it's not an insurmountable problem.

 

The question remains, how much countryside do you need in a GTA game? V's LS went way too much overboard IMO, with the city only being a tiny portion of the overall map, with almost no suburbs to speak of, and the country having very little detail overall. I can't speak for SA since I haven't played it much, but it does seem to have the right balance. And I don't think such a balance would be impossible to strike again. Again I point to Watch Dogs for having a large, alive-feeling city and some countryside too (although not that much).

Edited June 29, 2016 by RogerWho

[Mister Pink]

Interesting, you seem to have some experience.

 

.....The question remains, how much countryside do you need in a GTA game? V's LS went way too much overboard IMO, with the city only being a tiny portion of the overall map, with almost no suburbs to speak of, and the country having very little detail overall. I can't speak for SA since I haven't played it much, but it does seem to have the right balance. And I don't think such a balance would be impossible to strike again. Again I point to Watch Dogs for having a large, alive-feeling city and some countryside too (although not that much).

 

It's a good question. I'm a fan of countryside to counter city life. The contrast for me is fundamental in a game like GTA. I think it's mere existence in and of itself is important, even if you're not doing anything there or there isn't much to do there; It's visual, it passed-through, it offers a change of scenery and colour palette, space to fly over and potential for mission-scenario variety, however, so long as the city meets the standard in which case, for some, V wasn't what it could have been, notably the lack of suburbs.

 

Suburbs I find aren't the most appealing part of a GTA city although I thought South-Central was way too small in V. That's where gang-action and general GTA type shenanigans go on. If felt like an afterthought in V. Other than that, I felt the city was sizable enough. It has a huge docklands, airport, decent enough financial district, mansions on the hills etc. There's a little bit of everything but not really excelling or defined by anything related to the story. The south-central area was really representative of Franklin's story-plot. Not.. much going on and maybe diluted in the fight to share story time with two other characters.

 

Going back to your question. If there was a another city to the north of GTA V's map I think the countryside in middle would become even more important. It's a space that's supposed to represent time and distance between two places that otherwise wouldn't be so close together.

 

This image of San Andreas without cloud and fog really shows us the diversty of the map, sandy desert, luscious greenness and 3 cities. It's so diverse. If Rockstar were to expand the map I think another important issue would be to address map diversity. Even for the sake of having a different colour palette. Spending 20-30 hours in all grey with no change can be tiresome.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 29, 2016 by Mister Pink

[RogerWho]

That looks sweet. I really need to get around to order SA again and try it with all the PC mods.

 

Anyway, yea diversity is important. I still feel that V's LS failed in that though. It has a lot of different parts each with a different feel, but they are so small, and the roads so wide and empty, you just blast through several neighbourhoods in a few seconds. So at the end it doesn't feel like a real city, more like a toy miniature. Which, well it technically is anyway, but there are still other open world game cities which feel more real IMO. And some areas which are large enough still feel empty or artificial, like when I compare the industrial areas in IV's LC and V's LS.

 

Also, while I've never been to LA, honestly I feel like the 'poor district' where Franklin comes from is a bit of an insult to actual poor people, which undermined the story. But maybe it actually is that way and I got a worse picture from all the crime TV shows

 

Anyway, not to rant - I'm a city person, not a countryside person, so even in game I'm gonna prefer a city environment. After all, I think there are enough open-world countryside games - basically every Tolkien-based fantasy games, a lot of MMOs, the Far Cry series etc., while there aren't many open-world city games. And even some of those aren't based on the real world (e.g. the Prototype, Infamous, DarkSiders etc. series).

 

So yea, I'd vote for a big city area, or multiple dense cities, with some countryside, but not too much of the latter.

 

BTW one thing where I feel LC and LS are under-appreciated are the underground tunnels and the subways. There was barely any need to include these since they have very little function and most people would stick to the outside anyway, but even those areas provide some nice variety. In fact after checking out the tunnels under LS thoroughly, I wanted to play a game in such tunnels. Then I remembered tunnels are like 90% of all shooter games prior to COD4.

 

One could say the sea around LS also provides more variety, but in that case I think that amount of effort could rather be used for the city itself.

 

Um, back to work I guess.

[Mister Pink]

I was playing through the 'HD' SA on my 360 before I sold it. Dying to play it again. I also had the Xbox version on the 360. It was great having the two different games on one console. I might just get it for my laptop if anyone wants to PM me the best way how. I've purchased that game new so many times. Although I might pick up a second hand original Xbox to play The Warriors and the GTA III/VC pack again, sorry going way off topic there.

 

I agree with you about the parts of the city being too small. You can almost sort of miss them as you fly through the in a car.

 

I would also consider myself as a city person too in real life and for GTA. It might seem like I'm going on about countryside too much but I do value it as a contrast to the city. It's maybe not so much that it's countryside, it's probably that I value variety over monotony. I think I'm a little ADHD.

 

I agree with you about the underground tunnels. In IV, they're an amazing touch and I love the sense of wonder of what's down there but they don't function that much more. I would never like them to go though. As I mentioned before I would love the density of the city build around more tunnels, sewers and hidden and hard to find places.

 

I would love if Rockstar applied heavy doses of Deus Ex style mission and environmental structure to the next game. For example, you need to infiltrate a police station. There's no easy way in through the front as you'll be spotted. However, you notice there is a shore/manhole and there's some boxes you can move. Without going into too detail, basically there's 2 or 3 says to get in to building an none of 3 ways is too obvious. It requires some sneaking, some using your head, sewers, ladders, coded doors to hack etc.

 

If Rockstar focused on 6 major heists last time, I could envision them making some big set-missions that focus on multiple approaches, using stealth, lock-picking, computer-hacking to infiltrate large buildings but that's another topic. I would just love to see some use of the crouch features or see them add a crawl feature and use of vents, sewers, underground routes and hand to hand combat. Basically a denser city with more excuse to be on foot and not locked in to a vehicle all the time.

Edited June 30, 2016 by Mister Pink

[RogerWho]

True true.

 

BTW I always wondered how these open worlds are incorporated into the story and mission design. Do they make the scenery first and then base the missions on what assets are available? Such as, you need a tutorial mission which contains climbing over a fence, so you pick a spot with a low enough fence. Or the other way around? I.e. place the right fence where you're designing the mission.

 

It must be hell to coordinate such an effort, especially if more stuff is included, such as voice lines describing the street names etc.

 

Still, true, I'd say that with the environment richness that's available now, multiple entry points or different ways to finish a task should be possible. But I can also imagine it's an extra layer of coordination between the asset designers and the mission designers. But it surely is something we can expect in the upcoming generation of games. Watch Dogs (again) kinda meddled with this, there was stealth and gadgets, although at the end it was almost always easier to just kill everybody anyway.

 

It also makes me remember Hitman 2. Some missions in that game felt quite open-world-ish and had half a dozen ways to finish the level. I only played bits of some of the later games and while they still offered multiple choices, they didn't feel as open.

Edited June 29, 2016 by RogerWho