There are plenty of reasons to be excited for the next-generation versions of Grand Theft Auto V. The core game was amazing back when it was released on the PS3 and Xbox 360, and exploring Los Santos is still an absolute blast. Even so, the next-gen versions come with a wealth of new improvements for those with newer hardware: improved graphics, smoother gameplay and more things to do. Grand Theft Auto V was already a huge game, and it's getting even bigger on next-gen.
However, to the skeptics, it may not seem like GTA V on next-gen consoles has much to offer. Sure, there's more content and bonuses for returning players, but what about something truly new? By making the move to next-generation hardware, it seems like Rockstar could really change the way GTA V plays.
Of course, in typical Rockstar fashion, that's exactly what's happened. While speaking with IGN, Rockstar revealed a brand-new first-person mode for GTA V on next-generation consoles. It's not a small tweak, or part of a scripted moment or a simple controller setting: the full game, from start to finish, has been rebuilt to work from the first-person perspective.
On the PC, first-person modifications for games have been available for a long time, but it's not really the same thing. On PC, a first-person mod usually means that the camera has simply been moved, and nothing else. It can take a third-person game like Dark Souls and make it into something different, but without making other adjustments, the game can play poorly and animations usually break down (if the game doesn't outright crash).
This is not the case with GTA V; Rockstar went in and reworked the game from the ground up. Animations had to be reworked entirely: simply moving the camera won't matter if it looks like your character has to break their wrist to reload. In addition to the incredible number of new animations, Rockstar has thrown another coat of polish onto an already intricately detailed world: cars have fully-featured dashboards, signs and posters are all in HD and environmental effects have received an upgrade. Everything has to be changed for the new systems to work, but it requires far more effort than the average developer would be willing to put in. Then again, Rockstar is obviously not an average developer.
At first, it sounds like the switch in perspective isn't much, but considering just how much better GTA V looks on new consoles, it's a pretty noticeable shift. The last-gen versions of the game looked great, that's true, but this is something entirely new. There are so many little details. New animals, more populated streets, denser forests...Rockstar has gone above and beyond, and the first-person view is easily the best way to see the improvements. While some of the smaller details may be missed in the traditional third-person perspective, everything becomes visible up close. It's a clever way for Rockstar to highlight the new details and change how the game is played all at the same time.
Then again, why not give players the first-person mode on the older consoles? Well, to put it bluntly, the PS3 and the Xbox 360 simply couldn't handle it. According to Rockstar's Animation Director Rob Nelson, the game's graphics wouldn't have held up to such close scrutiny, and the team didn't have room to add an entire set of new animations:
"We were out of memory on the old consoles for animations. We were constantly fighting about what we could have and what we could still push in, and what other areas you could steal memory back from - audio, art, maps - for animation. So we could've added all the atoms to make a first-person mode to the level we wanted. We weren't sure the world would have held up the way we would've wanted it to."
Marketing teams often claim that a game 'couldn't have been done on last-generation hardware.' It's usually a tactic to get players to purchase the newest hardware, but in the case of GTA V, it's 100% sincere. It was a bit of a surprise that last-gen consoles could run GTA V at all, and to add another layer of systems on top of that would have simply been too much to handle. With the added horsepower of newer machines, Rockstar didn't have to worry about those limitations, plain and simple.
It's an interesting change of pace for the game. Nothing quite like a true first-person Grand Theft Auto has ever been attempted, and the new perspective could really shake things up for players who have already spent plenty of time within the Los Santos city limits.
There's only a few weeks left before next-gen owners finally get their hands on Grand Theft Auto V: the game is set to be released on Nov. 18.
