why is there no more damageable/destructible trains since GTA 2?

[gui7814]

one thing that i always found strange is that in gta 1 and 2 the trains are damageable and destructible, but from gta 3 the trains just became indestructible as if they were made of titanium or something. in the 2D Universe when a vehicle collides with a train, both explode, in the following games only if one of the vehicles is not a train it is damaged, and the train does not suffer any damage, now if the two vehicles are trains, In subsequent games the trains simply pass each other, while in the 2D universe the two explode.

I Have A Theory In The Case Of GTA 3, As The Game Was Released A Month And A Few Days After 9/11 So I Think They Removed The Damageable/Destructible Trains Why For Example: If The Player Blow Up A 3 Car Train , Then the Carcasses Would Explode and Form a Big Explosion and Also If the Player Stayed in the Same Place as the Carcass of the Train Is and the Carcass Would Not Disappear Then Another Train Would Come With Other Cars, They Would Collide with the Carcass and It Would Explode, Here It Comes Another one explodes and stays in this infinite cycle and each time accumulating more train carcasses and their wagons, I think that if Rockstar released the game with this feature, maybe it would generate a very big controversy...

 

But Despite This Theory Explaining The Case Of GTA 3 Kind Of Doesn't Explain Why From GTA SA The Feature Was Not Reimplemented...

 

But Anyway... I'd Like To Hear Your Theories If You Have Any.

[universetwisters]

Can’t you derail the train in SA? It’s not like that’s not destructive to it 

[gui7814]

4 minutes ago, universetwisters said:

Can’t you derail the train in SA? It’s not like that’s not destructive to it 

yes, you can derail the train in gta sa, but what i meant by "destructible" was the player having the ability to blow it up.

[universetwisters]

23 minutes ago, gui7814 said:

yes, you can derail the train in gta sa, but what i meant by "destructible" was the player having the ability to blow it up.

I remember you can target the train with a heat seaking rocket launcher tho. Idk maybe it was planned in fact to have been blown up but some post 9/11 hysteria caused them to cut it in the final 

[cant remember]

Personally I prefer them being indestructible. Trains IRL can cut through 18 wheelers like butter aswell.

[Guest]

Can be an inside joke among the vehicles dev to make train an entirely different unstoppable beast.

[Going_To_Aruba_01]

I kinda like how it was managed in SA. 

They could be jacked and even derailed and that was about it.

Although they couldn't really be harmed in any way, nevermind take visual damage. 

 

I'd imagine it would just be limitations/restraints like even in SA when CJ gets hit by a train, the camera bugs out and clips into the train and CJ just makes pain noises while his health drains until Wasted, like if he got flattened by a car rolling on top of him.

For instance in III Claude either takes massive damage or is even insta killed by the train and is only ever thrown aside/back appropriately. I don't think I've ever actually seen someone get run over by the trains in III just hit by them.

I'd imagine this bug in SA is likely caused by the fact that they are drivable in that game and therefore are treated slightly differently since nothing like this happens in the likes of III, LCS, 4, EFLC etc...

 

Not a gamebreaker or anything, but it could be an example of how trains are just too complicated to be treated similarly to the system that is used to treat cars. And could explain why they haven't been fully comandable in freeroam since, only rideable.

 

And it kinda hammers home the fact that trains are less than desirable to run into if you're a carjacker, if irl collisions are anything to go by. So by making them practically indestructible it helps cement them as the big bad in the game's world and how, like in real life, getting hit by one in a car and definitely on foot is certain death.

Like how in LCS, unlike III where they are completely non-solid, getting hit by an Airtrain blows up your car instantly because its as close as they could get to the real life consequences of driving into a f*cking plane lol. Sure, both would be wrecked by an RPG shot in real life, but it's a good way of keeping the player on their toes and even humbling them a bit.

 

I was gonna say that you might get what you wish for if GTA 6 ever drops but if its anything like 3D Vice City they might not be putting in any trains at all lol. We may never know.

 

Quick question of my own.

Could you derail the train in that one mission in V where Trevor has to steal one, as like punishment for messing around too much therefore falling the mission? Or is that just the Mandela Effect at play in my brain because I'm used to SA?

And hey, the windows on the front of the train are shootable/smashable in V so that's something lol.

[universetwisters]

1 hour ago, Going_To_Aruba_01 said:

Could you derail the train in that one mission in V where Trevor has to steal one

 

Nah it cuts to Michael dicking around in a boat and going to a bridge where it shows Trevor crashing into another train

[LowTierDude]

because unfortunately GTA's core game design/philosophy is still stuck at around the 2001-2004 level. Saints Row 1 and 2 had destructible trees and trains and other franchises like Watch Dogs and Mafia (and standalone titles like Scarface and Sleeping Dogs) had interactive in-game world and AI features that should have been in GTA from at least IV onwards imo. Even in RDR2 (a great game nevertheless) it just feels like a basic San Andreas skeleton with a lot more intricate yet scripted options.

Edited September 9, 2023 by kobeni

[gui7814]

On 9/7/2023 at 9:26 AM, cant remember said:

Personally I prefer them being indestructible. Trains IRL can cut through 18 wheelers like butter aswell.

The fact that a real-life train is very resistant does not mean that it is completely indestructible.

 

On 9/7/2023 at 8:10 PM, Going_To_Aruba_01 said:

I'd imagine it would just be limitations/restraints like even in SA when CJ gets hit by a train, the camera bugs out and clips into the train and CJ just makes pain noises while his health drains until Wasted, like if he got flattened by a car rolling on top of him.

For instance in III Claude either takes massive damage or is even insta killed by the train and is only ever thrown aside/back appropriately. I don't think I've ever actually seen someone get run over by the trains in III just hit by them.

I'd imagine this bug in SA is likely caused by the fact that they are drivable in that game and therefore are treated slightly differently since nothing like this happens in the likes of III, LCS, 4, EFLC etc...

 

Not a gamebreaker or anything, but it could be an example of how trains are just too complicated to be treated similarly to the system that is used to treat cars. And could explain why they haven't been fully comandable in freeroam since, only rideable.

Maybe that's the reason, maybe making them indestructible would cause a lot of bugs and Rockstar was in too much of a hurry to finish GTA SA.

 

On 9/7/2023 at 8:10 PM, Going_To_Aruba_01 said:

And it kinda hammers home the fact that trains are less than desirable to run into if you're a carjacker, if irl collisions are anything to go by. So by making them practically indestructible it helps cement them as the big bad in the game's world and how, like in real life, getting hit by one in a car and definitely on foot is certain death.

Like how in LCS, unlike III where they are completely non-solid, getting hit by an Airtrain blows up your car instantly because its as close as they could get to the real life consequences of driving into a f*cking plane lol. Sure, both would be wrecked by an RPG shot in real life, but it's a good way of keeping the player on their toes and even humbling them a bit.

hmm... I don't know what to say about this, but I don't think that's why, they could at least make the trains have hp equivalent to that of a rhino.

 

In fact, one thing that I noticed and found a bit ironic is the fact that the airtrains are also indestructible and have the name "train" in their name.

Edited September 10, 2023 by gui7814

[Kiro Ivo]

On 9/9/2023 at 11:01 AM, kobeni said:

because unfortunately GTA's core game design/philosophy is still stuck at around the 2001-2004 level. Saints Row 1 and 2 had destructible trees and trains and other franchises like Watch Dogs and Mafia (and standalone titles like Scarface and Sleeping Dogs) had interactive in-game world and AI features that should have been in GTA from at least IV onwards imo. Even in RDR2 (a great game nevertheless) it just feels like a basic San Andreas skeleton with a lot more intricate yet scripted options.

I would like details on how the GTAs are stuck in the past and how other games fare better, intetesting.

[Kyoto]

The train used to be destructible in the early months of GTAO. Just saying.

 

[Evil empire]

Why is there no more damageable/destructible trains since GTA 2?

Because all you have to do is follow the damn train not destroy it.

 

More seriously I suppose it is due to technical limitations.

 

Stopping the train takes a logn time on a long distance and since the vehicles you hit are likely to explode having a destructible train would probably make the train deliveries sub-mission too complicated in GTA San Andreas.

And having an indestructible train makes things funnier when you are hunted by the police and the army.