Where should the next GTA be set?
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Buckle up, I found this quite interesting, had a lot of suggestions and various people to quote... 
Wellllll I was going to spout off a few places in Britain...
Not London, because it's been done (though it could do with a reprise?), and it's a crap setting for a driving-based game anyway. It's a city that I avoid going to by car if possible, and it's never been pleasant any time I've had to. Unless you wanted to make it a version mostly set around using the dirtbike to ride along the roofs of stationary cars and through the tube tunnels. Plus it's got, like, 4 or 5 airports, only one of which is both full-size and even arguably within the limits of a reasonable play-area.
Maybe not the Birmingham-Black Country metropolitan area, although a/ I live there, b/ it's high time it got some recognition, c/ it's slightly smaller than London but has a better concentration of suitable roads, including transurban motorways all the way down to country tracks, and much more interesting geography, d/ one big airport, and depending on the size of the zone 0-2 small ones and a handful of usable airfields, e/ I bet we can do scummy just as well as those saft cockneys (and also have some properly posh settings too)...
But, we're landlocked for a start, and pratting about on the water has become a big part of the GTA "thing". Plenty of reasonably large rivers, and of course all those canals which are ripe for ripping up with contraband jetskis or sportsboats, but really they'd just be like watery backstreets down which the police can't drive. We have a good train network, almost as good as the tube, but no underground or long distance elevated stuff so it's a bit dull storywise. Plus, no-one really knows who we are on the world stage, never mind all the high profile stuff that keeps going down around here (I live a half mile from Oscott College FFS, 8 from Brindley Place and 15 from Cofton Park ... you wanna tell me why those are significant (2 different reasons) without googling?)
Possibly the Liverpool-Manc axis (and thru the tunnels to Birkenhead as well, maybe down to the ostensibly quieter-and-safer Chester and back up around?)... serious amounts of dockland (where all the best criminal activity happens, of course) plus the ship canal, at least as good a motorway network in a real-life bizarre layout that Rockstar would nod knowingly at, a fair bit of gang violence and the like in certain places, along with posh stuff and redevelopment, plus people at least know who the Beatles and maybe even Oasis are. Plus trams could be a unique prospect for carnage. And the two airports are in sensible locations. But there aren't all so many famous criminals round there or organised crime groups. At least, I can't name any. It's just chavs
But then I remembered, anyway... they haven't done a "real" city rather than a pastiche since the old London add-on pack, and even that was questionable from a realism perspective. Far more "Austin Powers" than "Eastenders". So it'd have to be looky-soundy-like, cartoonised "theme park versions" of each of these. Which could work a bit better. Have a bit of creative license with it. Maybe have the main story set in London but you break out to these other areas (hell, far more plausible than going to NY / SF from Miami ... Liverpool's about 3 hours by car from London, and Brum's halfway up...). And cut out the interminable miles of repetitive samey suburbs (but keep SOME of them of course, for purposes of creating carnage in suburbia).
Heck, compress the distances, or keep the motorway relations, you can actually be sent to drive from one to the other. You won't have to do the whole thing, just hit the city limits and a cutscene takes over. Maybe include a part where there's an evasive (or hunting-down!) motorway driving segment vs a rival gang. Or an encounter at a service station, in a stationary tailback, etc.
That's a pretty good idea too. I'd be up for a slight return to original form as well - three cities, and, if not a character generator, then at least a choice of a few different character names + avatars that you can use.
The way old GTA (still a damn fun game) had 3 fairly well-packed cities and something like 6 or 8 different characters you could choose ... though their effect was little more than mascot status. I don't even know if it changed the dialogue any... e.g. whether it zapped the anti-white racism if you picked the chinese / black guy and were talking to the triads / rastas, or whether Bubby changed his offer of having "fresh pussy" available at his shack to something else if you were one of the girls... It'd be a good touch if things like that could happen in a newer version, though.
And I do like the idea of having a european tour, though you'd have to take pains to avoid it going too far over the top and becoming a bit Interstate '78/'82 farcical. Maybe there could be a couple of them... start off in London, hit a few spots in Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris... then the sequel shifts the action down to the Med - Lyon (or wherever it was in Taxi and Ronin), and/or Monaco, couple choice spots in Spain and Italy, and maybe even the Balkans.
Heck, you could just have it all in the one game and have each city as unlockable DLC. It takes effort to make each of those unique locations, after all. Pay once to get the engine and the city where the story starts, then it can go on a sort of branching path - pay to gain access to each one as missions that would take you there start to open up. But still make each area capable of offering a good few hours of satisfying gameplay with a consistent narriative that can be tied up if you don't go any further. Yknow. Don't take the piss is what I mean.
Means you can make it diverse as well. Couple mini-areas in the Alps where you can blart around Top Gear-style, frightening skiers and pissing off the Noise Police. Stag/Hen weekender in Warsaw that gets a bit out of hand. Wake up in Moscow and have to get to the airport/rail station and on a plane/train back West without getting arrested or just plain shot. A few more cameo appearances by other significant towns in france, spain, italy, germany, britain. A five-minute short set in Belgium. Go to Denmark. Get drunk on lager. Wake up in a hallucinogenic version of the game where you're driving dinky size open topped cars about and shooting people with nerf guns - until it transpires you're actually sober, but just came-to in the grounds of Legoland.
I don't know if we've had any kind of FPS / sandboxer / whatever game set on the harder streets of a UK city, particularly outside of the London box. One in Scotland would be spectacularly lulzworthy. And even include a sub-game where you hop on a bus down the M8 and try to survive being an Edinburgher in the wrong part of Glasgow... Impossible to actually win, you're just scored on how long you make it before being bundled into an ambulance.
(Not necessarily a GTA game, but it could be...)
Eating deep fried haggis and full breakfasts (in styrofoam trays) with black pudding, baked beans and tatty cakes to restore health... The health watchdogs would have a coronary. Ironically.
Maybe set it a few years further back when there was still some kind of glamour left in a few places, but the city was definitely on the skids already.
Anyway, I like the idea, it's like the ones above but on a more widespread scale. Maybe like GTA2 vs GTA1 or whatever. Or a mini version of the "european tour". Take a ride to the troublespots in different provinces of the one country... Particularly if we crank the clock back 20 years to when there was even worse economic deprivation and if you used "the c-word" in ireland you probably meant "ceasefire".
For those skimming ... also a yes to the different protagonist option. But it'd be nice to not be stuck with just the one. At least a choice of six would be nice, or a basic character generator... May not affect the story much in any material way, but your physical stats could make certain areas harder/easier to reach, or even possible/impossible (very few would be story related or required for 100% completion though! Unless there was a co-op option and the two of you worked together using very - or only subtly - different characters). As well as ethnicity, gender, weight & etc having minor influences on the dialogue and NPC reactions/attitudes of course (you'd probably have to be saddled with a fairly anodyne name though, so as not to be out of place with any of them).
Realism! ??
Wellllll I was going to spout off a few places in Britain...
Not London, because it's been done (though it could do with a reprise?), and it's a crap setting for a driving-based game anyway. It's a city that I avoid going to by car if possible, and it's never been pleasant any time I've had to. Unless you wanted to make it a version mostly set around using the dirtbike to ride along the roofs of stationary cars and through the tube tunnels. Plus it's got, like, 4 or 5 airports, only one of which is both full-size and even arguably within the limits of a reasonable play-area.
Maybe not the Birmingham-Black Country metropolitan area, although a/ I live there, b/ it's high time it got some recognition, c/ it's slightly smaller than London but has a better concentration of suitable roads, including transurban motorways all the way down to country tracks, and much more interesting geography, d/ one big airport, and depending on the size of the zone 0-2 small ones and a handful of usable airfields, e/ I bet we can do scummy just as well as those saft cockneys (and also have some properly posh settings too)...
But, we're landlocked for a start, and pratting about on the water has become a big part of the GTA "thing". Plenty of reasonably large rivers, and of course all those canals which are ripe for ripping up with contraband jetskis or sportsboats, but really they'd just be like watery backstreets down which the police can't drive. We have a good train network, almost as good as the tube, but no underground or long distance elevated stuff so it's a bit dull storywise. Plus, no-one really knows who we are on the world stage, never mind all the high profile stuff that keeps going down around here (I live a half mile from Oscott College FFS, 8 from Brindley Place and 15 from Cofton Park ... you wanna tell me why those are significant (2 different reasons) without googling?)
Possibly the Liverpool-Manc axis (and thru the tunnels to Birkenhead as well, maybe down to the ostensibly quieter-and-safer Chester and back up around?)... serious amounts of dockland (where all the best criminal activity happens, of course) plus the ship canal, at least as good a motorway network in a real-life bizarre layout that Rockstar would nod knowingly at, a fair bit of gang violence and the like in certain places, along with posh stuff and redevelopment, plus people at least know who the Beatles and maybe even Oasis are. Plus trams could be a unique prospect for carnage. And the two airports are in sensible locations. But there aren't all so many famous criminals round there or organised crime groups. At least, I can't name any. It's just chavs
But then I remembered, anyway... they haven't done a "real" city rather than a pastiche since the old London add-on pack, and even that was questionable from a realism perspective. Far more "Austin Powers" than "Eastenders". So it'd have to be looky-soundy-like, cartoonised "theme park versions" of each of these. Which could work a bit better. Have a bit of creative license with it. Maybe have the main story set in London but you break out to these other areas (hell, far more plausible than going to NY / SF from Miami ... Liverpool's about 3 hours by car from London, and Brum's halfway up...). And cut out the interminable miles of repetitive samey suburbs (but keep SOME of them of course, for purposes of creating carnage in suburbia).
Heck, compress the distances, or keep the motorway relations, you can actually be sent to drive from one to the other. You won't have to do the whole thing, just hit the city limits and a cutscene takes over. Maybe include a part where there's an evasive (or hunting-down!) motorway driving segment vs a rival gang. Or an encounter at a service station, in a stationary tailback, etc.
chris_ninety1 said:
Frybird said:
irani_che said:
That's a pretty good idea too. I'd be up for a slight return to original form as well - three cities, and, if not a character generator, then at least a choice of a few different character names + avatars that you can use.
The way old GTA (still a damn fun game) had 3 fairly well-packed cities and something like 6 or 8 different characters you could choose ... though their effect was little more than mascot status. I don't even know if it changed the dialogue any... e.g. whether it zapped the anti-white racism if you picked the chinese / black guy and were talking to the triads / rastas, or whether Bubby changed his offer of having "fresh pussy" available at his shack to something else if you were one of the girls... It'd be a good touch if things like that could happen in a newer version, though.
And I do like the idea of having a european tour, though you'd have to take pains to avoid it going too far over the top and becoming a bit Interstate '78/'82 farcical. Maybe there could be a couple of them... start off in London, hit a few spots in Amsterdam, Berlin, Paris... then the sequel shifts the action down to the Med - Lyon (or wherever it was in Taxi and Ronin), and/or Monaco, couple choice spots in Spain and Italy, and maybe even the Balkans.
Heck, you could just have it all in the one game and have each city as unlockable DLC. It takes effort to make each of those unique locations, after all. Pay once to get the engine and the city where the story starts, then it can go on a sort of branching path - pay to gain access to each one as missions that would take you there start to open up. But still make each area capable of offering a good few hours of satisfying gameplay with a consistent narriative that can be tied up if you don't go any further. Yknow. Don't take the piss is what I mean.
Means you can make it diverse as well. Couple mini-areas in the Alps where you can blart around Top Gear-style, frightening skiers and pissing off the Noise Police. Stag/Hen weekender in Warsaw that gets a bit out of hand. Wake up in Moscow and have to get to the airport/rail station and on a plane/train back West without getting arrested or just plain shot. A few more cameo appearances by other significant towns in france, spain, italy, germany, britain. A five-minute short set in Belgium. Go to Denmark. Get drunk on lager. Wake up in a hallucinogenic version of the game where you're driving dinky size open topped cars about and shooting people with nerf guns - until it transpires you're actually sober, but just came-to in the grounds of Legoland.
Hahaha ... wasn't stuff like this in Bully though?TyrantGanado said:
I don't know if we've had any kind of FPS / sandboxer / whatever game set on the harder streets of a UK city, particularly outside of the London box. One in Scotland would be spectacularly lulzworthy. And even include a sub-game where you hop on a bus down the M8 and try to survive being an Edinburgher in the wrong part of Glasgow... Impossible to actually win, you're just scored on how long you make it before being bundled into an ambulance.
(Not necessarily a GTA game, but it could be...)
Eating deep fried haggis and full breakfasts (in styrofoam trays) with black pudding, baked beans and tatty cakes to restore health... The health watchdogs would have a coronary. Ironically.
Yeah, but this would be getting on for the best part of FIFTEEN YEARS OLD by now. It's well overdue for an update given that all the three original cities have had at least one makeover each.Trolldor said:Sure you don't mean this:
Wow. This'd be awesome. You'd have to work in a good deal of Robocop and Motown references of course. And all the cars would have to be gas guzzlers.MichiganMuscle77 said:
Maybe set it a few years further back when there was still some kind of glamour left in a few places, but the city was definitely on the skids already.
I'm pretty sure you just described L.A. Noire...viranimus said:
Cuh, you think our criminals and gangsters don't have access to shooters? Please. We may not have proper licensed high-street gun shops (something that absolutely blows my mind about the states, BTW), but there's apparently a few stalls on a local market not too far away from where I'm sat that sell some kind of firearms (probably just air-rifles being misidentified by a startled visitor, but it's not like they can't do injury), and before I got licensed to take my bike on the motorway my route home took me through an area that's currently a test area for a acoustic police gunshot-detection system because once night falls it does a good impression of Compton.viranimus said:
Anyway, I like the idea, it's like the ones above but on a more widespread scale. Maybe like GTA2 vs GTA1 or whatever. Or a mini version of the "european tour". Take a ride to the troublespots in different provinces of the one country... Particularly if we crank the clock back 20 years to when there was even worse economic deprivation and if you used "the c-word" in ireland you probably meant "ceasefire".
What, Grand Theft Honda C50 Cub? Grand Theft Communist-Era Bicycle? Grand Theft Autorickshaw?viranimus said:
Heh, it's got a good mix of things that would make for a fun GTA game really and is (apparently) close to some of the other fun parts of town as well, like Hackney... (I'm having to go on second hand reports from friends who live round there, though). Crime capital but also the origins of the London Mardi Gras parade and all that.Bill Bread said:
For those skimming ... also a yes to the different protagonist option. But it'd be nice to not be stuck with just the one. At least a choice of six would be nice, or a basic character generator... May not affect the story much in any material way, but your physical stats could make certain areas harder/easier to reach, or even possible/impossible (very few would be story related or required for 100% completion though! Unless there was a co-op option and the two of you worked together using very - or only subtly - different characters). As well as ethnicity, gender, weight & etc having minor influences on the dialogue and NPC reactions/attitudes of course (you'd probably have to be saddled with a fairly anodyne name though, so as not to be out of place with any of them).
Realism! ??
I'd like to see vice city return, but that's just nostalgic me speaking
As mentioned before, Amsterdam would be really interesting. It has the 'image' for sure...
As mentioned before, Amsterdam would be really interesting. It has the 'image' for sure...
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. It has a higher auto theft rate than any other city in Canada and the US, and a pretty high crime rate overall. Nothing to be proud of, but it's fitting, no?
Plus, Rockstar could have lots of fun with Canadian stereotypes.
Plus, Rockstar could have lots of fun with Canadian stereotypes.
Grand Theft Auto: Atlantis.
Underwater bike hi-jacking :O
Grand Theft Auto: Sheens World
Inside the brain of Charlie Sheen.
Underwater bike hi-jacking :O
Grand Theft Auto: Sheens World
Inside the brain of Charlie Sheen.
Disney World
You could highjack the flying Dumbos and spinning tea cups, and get with the Disney princesses.
You could highjack the flying Dumbos and spinning tea cups, and get with the Disney princesses.
Amsterdam,
its a city based on drugs! how would that not work?
you could easily flee from the police by boat jacking!
its a city based on drugs! how would that not work?
you could easily flee from the police by boat jacking!
i think anything but the united states would be a good idea. i dont have anything against the us but i think there should be a little variety.
@henritje
amsterdam is a really good idea.
it could be called gtaa
or
grand theft amsterdam
@henritje
amsterdam is a really good idea.
it could be called gtaa
or
grand theft amsterdam
