GTA V

[Flack]

I played for about three hours last night.

During the first hour, I installed the game.

During the second hour, I played some guy during a bank robbery. This is really just a tutorial to make sure you know how to make people walk around and do things but somehow I failed it a dozen times. I was like GTAV BITCH! and started shooting hostages, which caused my fellow bank robbers to shoot me. Then I would have to start over and I would just shoot my fellow bank robbers in revenge. That didn't work out well either. Eventually I did rob the bank and shoot cops for a while. The "aiming dot" is ridiculously small and hard to see so I spent a lot of time firing into the ground because I couldn't see it. If there's auto-aiming I couldn't find it. So eventually those guys got killed and I was reincarnated into a black car repo guy.

Well, how about we N-WORD N-WORD N-WORD N-WORD? Yes, let's N-WORD N-WORD N-WORD today! Okay N-WORD? Sounds good to me N-WORD! I heard the N-WORD last night more times than I have heard it in the past 10 years. Where I live I never hear the N-WORD in real life. Then again where I live there are no black people.

So anyway me and my N-WORD repossessed some cars and by the time I got mine to the auto shop mine had to be worth $100 because the bumper was hanging off and all the paint was gone from jumping it and landing on top of a bus. I drive like a crazy N-WORD! Then, like ICJ, I went home, put on a hoodie and a hat and took a nap. Then I woke up and was supposed to go get a haircut to look like a real N-WORD but instead I stole a city bus and drove around smashing into cop cars until I ended up jumping it down into a drainage ditch and losing my tires. I couldn't find the punch button so I got out and ran around jumping in the air until a cop shot my N-WORD in the head. The end.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I'll check it out when it is available for the Commodore 16.

[lethargic]

During the second hour, I played some guy during a bank robbery. This is really just a tutorial to make sure you know how to make people walk around and do things but somehow I failed it a dozen times. I was like GTAV BITCH! and started shooting hostages, which caused my fellow bank robbers to shoot me. Then I would have to start over and I would just shoot my fellow bank robbers in revenge. That didn't work out well either. Eventually I did rob the bank and shoot cops for a while. The "aiming dot" is ridiculously small and hard to see so I spent a lot of time firing into the ground because I couldn't see it. If there's auto-aiming I couldn't find it. So eventually those guys got killed and I was reincarnated into a black car repo guy.

Can't find auto-aim? I find auto-aim to be incredibly over powered in this game. As long as you aim anywhere in the vicinity of your target it puts the dot right on their chest when you pull the left trigger. Unless you're trying to shoot hostages or civilians. It only aims at the people you're SUPPOSED to shoot.

You can go in the options and change the dot to a circle.

Well, how about we N-WORD N-WORD N-WORD N-WORD? Yes, let's N-WORD N-WORD N-WORD today! Okay N-WORD? Sounds good to me N-WORD! I heard the N-WORD last night more times than I have heard it in the past 10 years. Where I live I never hear the N-WORD in real life. Then again where I live there are no black people.

You musta missed the Zimmerman trial! LLLOOLLLL

[ICJ]

Here is the thing. I am enjoying the game. I did the mission with "Chop" and I am looking for someone named "EJ" whom we don't know and haven't met (awesome narrative! I'm super psyched to find a guy we've never met in the game!).

I am enjoying the missions and I love that I will be able to skip them after giving it the old college try.

But I want all of you to admit that the plotting is the most horrible thing that has ever appeared in a video game. Look, I am looking forward to getting the two psychos I've seen and the unseen third to work together in a heist. That sounds great.

But quite frankly, I can't continue this BBS if at least one of you can't admit that having the first 20 minutes be with one guy and then the next 5+ hours (though at this point, who knows?) be with Franklin and then a third guy is lower on the level than a six-year old playing with his action figures.

One of you PLEASE ADMIT THE INCOMPETENCE.

And like I said, I am enjoying everything else about the game. It's a **** star game. If I were to put it in a score, I'd give it a solid 79/100. (Unlike print magazines and websites, I use the entire 0-100 spectrum. My experience with Far Cry 3 was a 14/100. Shadowrun Returns is a 85/100 and Bioshock 3 is an 8/100.)

[lethargic]

I am looking for someone named "EJ" whom we don't know and haven't met (awesome narrative! I'm super psyched to find a guy we've never met in the game!).

By this logic, how could you ever enjoy entertainment? Do you expect to get a full list and background of every character in a movie before they come on sscreen? Why do you need to know EJ before you meet him? Meet him, then you'll know him. haha

But quite frankly, I can't continue this BBS if at least one of you can't admit that having the first 20 minutes be with one guy and then the next 5+ hours (though at this point, who knows?) be with Franklin and then a third guy is lower on the level than a six-year old playing with his action figures.

One of you PLEASE ADMIT THE INCOMPETENCE.

No. This would be like watching Star Wars and complaining that Leia isn't in every frame just because she was in the first 10 minutes.

Did it take too long? Yes. But incompetent? No.

Michael is retired, so there would be nothing to do with him at the start of the game. Franklin is the trigger that pulls him out of retirement.

So it makes sense to spend time with Franklin because the story needs time to explain how Franklin and Michael come to meet and their motivations to start working together.

If there is a problem with the Franklin portion it's that they could've left side missions and whatnot for later. If all you did at that point was the actual story missions, it would've gotten to Michael much quicker, while still telling the same story and you wouldn't have to waste so much time in that tow truck.

[ICJ]

I found a Countach tonight!

[AArdvark]

I an going over to my brother's house later today. One or more of my nephews have this game and based on this (and only this) thread I will look into this GTAV first hand.



THE
MEME
AARDVARK

[lethargic]

I just found out that there are 3 endings in the game. 2 out of the 3 makes it impossible to actually 100% the game unless you've already done everything beforehand.

Now THAT is incompetence. I've played open world games where the main characters died but even they would still let you free roam after you finished the story. Why the hell would GTA do something that would NOT let you free roam? I mean, that's the point of the game to many people.

[ICJ]

I am looking for someone named "EJ" whom we don't know and haven't met (awesome narrative! I'm super psyched to find a guy we've never met in the game!).

By this logic, how could you ever enjoy entertainment? Do you expect to get a full list and background of every character in a movie before they come on sscreen? Why do you need to know EJ before you meet him? Meet him, then you'll know him. haha

I accept that there could be a reason we have not met him yet. But the only reason I am trying to find him is because the game is making me do so. They aren't pressed for any sort of speedy plot here -- they could have had "EJ" show up in a required side mission. Then I might care where he is.

As it stands, the best decision Franklin could make would be to simply take the tow truck job. Every problem he encounters later is due to the fact that the insane psychopath had a chance for a normal job and doesn't take it.

Michael is retired, so there would be nothing to do with him at the start of the game. Franklin is the trigger that pulls him out of retirement.

AGREED. This part is fine.

If there is a problem with the Franklin portion it's that they could've left side missions and whatnot for later. If all you did at that point was the actual story missions, it would've gotten to Michael much quicker, while still telling the same story and you wouldn't have to waste so much time in that tow truck.

AGREED. You just agreed with me. OooOOOOooOOHHHHH! They are spending too much time having Franklin do shit that nobody cares about. Why would I want to tow a car twice? Why??? Why...

Also, if there is a third playable character named "Trevor" that I haven't met yet, it is weird to me that their structure is this:

1) Highly-exciting mission with Michael. (25 minutes of gameplay)
2) Some highly-exciting missions with Franklin (one-two hours?)
3) The most boring shit in the world with Franklin (two to ... thirty hours? I dunno)
4) Let's Meet Trevor

So in terms of pacing, it would be like if we met Aragon for the first time halfway through The Two Towers.

[lethargic]

I accept that there could be a reason we have not met him yet. But the only reason I am trying to find him is because the game is making me do so. They aren't pressed for any sort of speedy plot here -- they could have had "EJ" show up in a required side mission. Then I might care where he is.

So you didn't want to save the Princess in Super Mario Bros because you never sat down and had a conversation with her beforehand? haha

So in terms of pacing, it would be like if we met Aragon for the first time halfway through The Two Towers.

Movies and games aren't the same animal. GTA is a 50 hour experience. The pacing can be much different than a 2-3 hour movie.

I honestly think that once you get deep into the game and the story the decisions make sense and everything comes together logically.

[AArdvark]

OK I watched the game for about forty minutes today. I must have picked a bad spot to check in cause My nephew had to make his character DO YOGA! FOR TEN MINUTES!

Yoga? Seriously?

Then there was the part about flying around the city like Peter Pan in day-glo colors wearing nothing but boxer shorts.

What kind of game is this?


After that it better. Drive around like a crazed person, which is cool, then later, fly a helicopter and shoot other helicopters.


Xbox 360 graphics.....8/10

Storyline.............9/10

Controls............N/A although it looked like he was having a difficult time controlling the game in spots.

Gameplay immersion.......10/10



I'm not going to get this one. I'll wait for Mafia 3


THE
PASS
AARDVARK

[Flack]

I got a couple more hours of play time in today.

I (playing as Franklin) and Lamar went on a mission where we went and shot a bunch of gangsters hanging out in a garage and repossessed a bike, which Lamar decided to keep. I am starting to get the feeling that Lamar is not an upstanding citizen.

From there I moved on to my first tow truck mission. I used the tow truck to haul an abandoned car back to a car lot while a crack ho kept trying to get into my pants. It seems a little ridiculous that Franklin would use a tow truck to move a car when he can enter any car in the city and drive it by simply pressing the green triangle.

After towing a car back to the lot I left, found the strip club, paid for a drink, paid for a lap dance, grabbed the girl's boobs until the bouncers threw me out, went back inside, started a fight, ran outside, stole a car, led the police on a high speed chase, wrecked my car, and got shot in the belly.

So pretty much it was just like my real life.

[lethargic]

OK I watched the game for about forty minutes today. I must have picked a bad spot to check in cause My nephew had to make his character DO YOGA! FOR TEN MINUTES!

Yoga? Seriously?

You should've seen the mission where you have to mop. Yes. Seriously.

There are also triathlons to do. You must medal in all 3 to 100% the game. Today I had a few minutes left to play so I decided to try do the last triathlon race. The first two took 5-10 minutes. I figured, PERFECT!

I start this damn thing and I'm swimming and I'm swimming and I'm swimming and I'm swimming. Then I got to the bike part and I'm biking and I'm biking and I'm like holy crap it's been 20 minutes. Now I'm well past the time I needed to quit. I'm enraged. Because now I'm stuck. I need to get off but I do NOT want to do 20 minutes of swimming and biking again. So I just push through and I'm biking and I'm biking and I'm biking. I'm pissed the whole time so I'm messing up and crashing and I'm in last place. I'm like dag nabit I'm gonna end up losing this and having to do all it all over again anyway. Finally I get to the foot race part and I'm running and running and running and running and running. You have to repeatedly tap A to run, swim or bike so I'm getting arthritis and running and running. 40 mutha hucking minutes it took. And in the end it's apparently programmed to let you win as all the other racers started walking instead of running and let me go by. ENRAGING.

[lethargic]

After towing a car back to the lot I left, found the strip club, paid for a drink, paid for a lap dance, grabbed the girl's boobs until the bouncers threw me out, went back inside, started a fight, ran outside, stole a car, led the police on a high speed chase, wrecked my car, and got shot in the belly.

I think the question here is who did NOT go directly to the strip and get a lap dance within the first couple of hours?

[lethargic]

I finished the story tonight. Time to grind out this 100% achievement. And GTA Online opens today. I am excited for that. But they're saying these first two weeks is basically a stress test. I hope I actually get to play it without a million crashes.

After finishing the game each character only has 31 million. I still have no idea how I'm supposed to make enough money to buy that 150 million dollar golf course.

After finishing it, I can easily say it's the best GTA ever. It's got a few bugs that annoy me and some missions that get on my last nerves, but overall, this one is much more deserving of the hype than the past games. But I still can't shake the nagging feeling that this whole genre is overdue for a makeover. The formula is getting really old. Drive to A, shoot people, run and hide from the cops. Drive to B, shoot people, run and hide from the cops. The missions all put on different dresses, but they're still the same haggard old lady underneath.

I also can't help but be disappointed over the amount of heists in the game. The previews all said committing heists were the backbone of the game, but there's really only 3. There's a couple more break ins, but they're not heists and you don't make any money from them. Heists were great fun but I wanted more of them. Particularly with how your crew members gain experience from them and get better. What is the point of having that in the game when you, at most, use the same guy twice?

But it's a big upgrade over the overbearing seriousness of IV. I also think Trevor took the whole thing up a notch over previous GTAs.

Since GTA's character are always so serious, and as "heroic" as they can be in this world, I never have fun doing the crazy stuff. In the last game, Niko was too nice and likable to go driving down the sidewalk. Going around and randomly committing mass murder with that character made NO sense in my brain. I did it some, but it wasn't as fun as Saints Row where you can make your character whatever you want it to be.

By putting a complete lunatic like Trevor in the game it made that part of the game way more fun for me. With Trevor I feel like I can do anything and it always makes sense because Trevor would do anything.

[lethargic]

GTA Online's character creator is the worst character creator in the history of video games.

In case you haven't seen it yet, since the servers have only worked for 5 minutes today, here is how it works...

You have a few presets to choose from. Only the presets aren't your character, it's your character's grandparents. And the box is so small you can't really tell what they look like. You can only see skin tone.

Selecting both sets of grandparents gives you your parents. For each parent you have a slider that makes them look either more like their mother or their father. (Or you can just set John Marston from RDR as your father. I tried that and my character looked NO different from when he just had the random father.)

After you do that you have a slider to decide if your character looks more like your mother or father.

At this point my character looked like William Powell.

In the next section it has a list of questions asking how long you do certain things per day.

How many hours do you sleep per day?
How many hours do you spend doing illegal activities?
How many hours do you spend doing legal activities?
How many hours do you spend hanging with friends?
How many hours do you spend watching TV?
How many hours do you spend playing sports?

You assign hours to these questions and your choices change how your character looks, change his clothing and sets his beginning stats.

At this point my character looked like William Powell in a dirty t-shirt.

Then in the last section you can select a haircut and facial hair.

At this point my character looks like William Powell with a beard.

It. is. TERRIBLE.

To rub salt in the wound I read an interview with some Rockstar guy who said that they felt character creators suck and they were going to revolutionize them. He said sitting there picking out noses and eyes is stupid because that's not how it happens in real life. That in real life two parents create a kid and that determines how he looks.

But who asked for this to be realistic? I want to make a character look how I want it to look. I want to make a character that looks like me. I want to be a short, fat, bald guy with a beard.

The saddest thing is that even the hair and facial hair options you can change are very limited. You have much less options in creating your original character than you do in the real game. You can change the look of Michael, Trevor and Franklin WAY more than you can change the look of yourself. It's terrible.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Why does Franklin keep saying he loves those tattoos when there aren't any?

[lethargic]

I found that after completing the storyline I lost all interest in the game. I wanted to do the side missions and the achievements but...I don't want to touch the game anymore. It's like watching a movie that you really like but you don't want to watch it twice.

I had hoped GTA Online would bring me back but they've completely botched it and hasn't worked in 2 days.

You want to talk about incompetence?? Could you imagine if CoD came out and the online didn't work for 2 days?

Anyway. My GTA V is currently on Ebay.

I thought I would be playing this game until Arkham Origins came out. Maybe this is better. Used copies are still going for retail price on Ebay. So I can just use this money to buy Arkham and it's like I bought one and got one free!

[lethargic]

Am I the only creeped out to see these guys in real life?

[youtube][/youtube]

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Anyway. My GTA V is currently on Ebay.

I am deeply saddened by what that piece of garbage who won the auction did to you. But that's the closest he was ever going to come to owning it, I guess. I feel that this guy is someone we can fuck with for years to come.