Is Rockstar big enough to admit its faults? (Picture: Rockstar Games)

A reader worries Rockstar is too proud to admit its gameplay needs to improve and predicts that GTA 6 will have the same problems as GTA 5.

I set up my PlayStation 4 again, just before Baldur’s Gate 3 released on PlayStation 5. I got both Divinity: Original Sin games very cheap in a bundle, just to see if I’d get on with them, for an idea of if I was going to buy Baldur’s Gate 3 or not.

I didn’t put it away when I was done, so after watching the GTA 6 trailer I thought it might be fun to play GTA 5 again. It wasn’t.

I dismissed the letters about graphics over gameplay after the trailer was released but they weren’t wrong. I never had a problem with the gunplay even though it gets called out in every new GTA release. But I always hated the driving challenge missions that were part of the main campaign and couldn’t be avoided.

I think Rockstar are aware the handling of the cars isn’t great, which is why Franklyn’s special power, or whatever, is slowing time when he’s driving.

The mission where Michael’s wife gets caught shoplifting and he steals a police car to get her out of it is like pulling teeth to me though.

I also dismissed the Reader’s Feature about GTA 6 being bad for society out of hand. I never bought into the idea of video games corrupting the people who played them. I still don’t.

But I called my GTA 5 revisit a day when I got to the mission where we play as Trevor and have to torture a guy. I did play through it on PlayStation 3 but this time it was too much and left me wondering what made Rockstar think that was a good idea.

As an aside, the funny thing about that is those opportunistic politicians on their soapbox banging on about it being possible to rob and kill prostitutes in previous titles, to paraphrase Maud Flanders ‘won’t someone please think of the children’.

But I don’t remember them having much to say about a psychopath torturing an Arabic man. Maybe that was the whole point of that mission? Or maybe I’m giving Rockstar too much credit.

GTA 5 isn’t the only older game I’ve played recently. I played The Witcher 2 for the story and lore but it sucked for gameplay.

I’ve also been playing Horizon Zero Dawn again, which doesn’t, but it did feel like hard work after Horizon Forbidden West.

What I think is interesting is that CD Projekt Red totally overhauled their formula for The Witcher 3. I’m sure some would say they were limited by the Xbox 360, but Skyrim released at around the same time.

The difference between Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West isn’t as big. There are tweaks rather than a complete overhaul, but they made a fairly big difference anyway.

Both developers saw there were issues and put them right and the sequels they released were all the better for it. But Rockstar have never done that.

From GTA 3 to 5 the only evolution has been Rockstar taking advantage of the available technology; the gameplay hasn’t changed that much, other than bloat and the size of the maps. The gunplay and driving are as bad in GTA 5 as they were in 3.

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There was a motorcycle mission against the clock in Vice City and it was the ropey handling of the bike that made it difficult. It was exactly the same in GTA 5 when any character, other than Franklyn, was driving as the playable character.

After all these years I see no reason to think Rockstar will have put aside their ego, listened to the criticism and changed any of that stuff for GTA 6. The gunplay and driving are going to be as slack in that as they have been in every previous GTA from the 3D era.

The problem is I’ll buy it anyway.

By reader Mitchell

The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.

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A reader worries Rockstar is too proud to admit its gameplay needs to improve and predicts that GTA 6 will have the same problems as GTA 5.