Zero Punctuation: Grand Theft Auto 5

Griffolion

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Aug 18, 2009
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StriderShinryu said:
pube igniting masterpiece
Memorised. Using that the next time i'm in work in a casual conversation.

OT: Not played GTA V, the franchise never really excited me. But hopefully Yahtzee can make it through the shit storm that be comin' his way with a less then absolutely gushing review of this game. I'm sure he can, he is the ultimate honey badger.
 

IrisNetwork

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WAIT! He'll be gone for 2 weeks? D:
No Rayman Legends review? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
I really enjoyed that game. More than even SR4 and GTAV. I'd really like to see Yahtzee's opinions on the music levels.
 

head desk tricycle

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It seems weird to complain about excessive appraisal of Yahtzee himself in these threads (isn't that partially the reason why they're here?) but on the other hand, nothing he says is questionable at all. GTAV is basically just San Andreas, recapturing that same spirit of glorious half-baked excess; it also looks like there was a less than successful effort to recapture the cool finesse of Vice City (when you include two minor variations of Tommy Vercetti as playable characters, you're slightly missing the point there). So it's nothing new, although they did successfully improve on the formula in at least one awesome way (the missions have stylish scores) and one extremely belated way (wildlife), which makes it great for the fans; and for everyone else, it has lots of pretty colors to keep you semi-interested. Apathy is an extremely appropriate way for a critic to react to this game.
 

Kittyhawk

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Zero makes some good points about GTAV that stopped me from buying it. Sure, I may pick it up at some point but after being bored by GTAIV, I'll stick with my reluctance.

Rockstar are not without talent. I just wish they'd use it better by producing more stuff like Bully and Red Dead, than fleeing back to the GTA well when that series has been drummed into the ground as much as any Fifa or CoD. Many GTA fans will love it but I'm not wowed by big city graphic environments with only so much to do, like I was for GTA San Andreas and GTA IV.

They've made their money and will be back for more with the PC version. Recent bugs and online niggles won't upset their apple cart too much.

So, instead of getting GTA, I'm going to seek out Red Dead GotY version.
 

Millky95

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I've been reading different reviews and comments about GTAV since it's release to see if I should pick it up and the result seems to be "it's good but wait for a cheep PC version or it's on sale and not full price". The Mass Effect (wow I seem to mention that game every time I post here) series is my favourite series due to story and characters and that seems to be what's missing in GTAV for me. GTA does have the online and classic "dicking around" feature but I'm not big on online and SR4 has the same dicking around feature and a funner story.

Kittyhawk said:
I just wish they'd use it better by producing more stuff like Bully
If they made a new Bully game with Gary and Jimmy somehow, I would be all over it. One of the funnest sandbox games due to it's unique nature. And being in my final year at school, it is rather appealing
 

Something Amyss

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duchaked said:
[Franklin was very much a Connor-esque paperboy being led along by everyone, but it was Lamar who annoyed the crap about me with his "homies for life" deal until the end when he redeemed himself haha.
Dear God. I mean, yeah. God forbid anyone want to better themselves and not spend their lives being ripped off by drug fiends and used by employers.

That seemed to be the entire theme of everyone surrounding Franklin. While I actually kind of liked Franklin, he was the hardest of the characters to cope with story-wise. For me, anywho.

OuendanCyrus said:
I actually haven't touched my 360 since I completed Skyrim nearly 2 years ago.
So basically, your taste has completely changed in the two years since? Probably not. Not according to the games you've played on GFWL and that's as far as I'm willing to look

The main reason that I can't enjoy GTA V is mainly how the world is so large, yet feels like there's not much to do; sure, there's strip clubs, yes, there's golf and tennis, but I never found out whether they contributed to the gameplay. I understand that they are just distractions that are meant to make the player feel more immersed in the game, but I would have preferred it if those distractions actually helped me in the game as opposed to feeling like a time waster. (I did try playing Tennis for a bit because I thought it would raise my Stamina but I don't think it did) Look at Just Cause 2 for example, it has a huge world filled with bases you can take over, and in doing so, you earn more cash and upgrades, in Saint's Row IV, you collect data clusters to improve your super powers, in Red Dead Redemption and Far Cry 3, you can do animal and bounty hunts to get money and improve your character.
Sports increase your strength and allow you to take more damage in gameplay. So yes, by your RDR definition, they do impact gameplay. I'm sorry you didn't notice, but it's real.

Most things in the game afford you cash or stat awards. Not all of them, and cash is a bit screwed up. But if your definition is on things to do that don't impact the gameplay, I think the only activity with no such impact is the strip club. And I think that's mostly so horny fifteen year olds can see tits. This is a Rockstar title we're talking about.

I think the game does too good of a job for punishing you, especially for a game where most of the fun is generated by you doing crimes.
I actually find myself longing for Saints Row 2/3 when it comes to the crimes, so that much I can agree with. Still, it's not hard to evade the cops to 4 stars. It just becomes tedious. Especially when they seem to spawn them just to fuck with you. It's really easy to get a 1 star and it takes too long to get rid of it. I don't think that breaks the game, though.

Sgt. Sykes said:
Of course, I'm the kind of person who plays helicopter simulators so I'm weird, but what you say is exactly my point - fun is subjective ergo you can say SR is faster, but I do object to labeling it fun just by default.
but we're labeling it more fun because we find it more fun. And that's the thing. This seems to be understood by everyone else. You may enjoy the "more realistic" controls of GTA IV, but others didn't. also, if I had a car that handled like that, I'd not only return the vehicle, but do my best to drive the company out of business.

We really shouldn't have to stop and say "in my opinion" after every line of text, every contextual statement, every non-empirical piece of information offered.

But at the same time, GTA has evolved into a chore simulator, and I have trouble seeing why that's considered fun. Maybe you find Facebook games fun, but it seems to me most people play them as time wasters, not as legitimate hobbies. And if that's what makes you happy, fine. But be realistic.

I mean, one of the missions in GTAV has you mopping the floor. and you have to clean out your mop head. Now, maybe you're the type of gamer who enjoys floor-mopping simulators. Maybe Environmental Services Hero is one of your big pre-orders every year. But it shouldn't really be that hard to figure out why emulating chores in video games isn't popular.
 

Headdrivehardscrew

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Ed130 said:
So you find it average with poor writing, pointless RPG elements, by the nose story missions and no overarching plot.

Not GOTY material then?
It's funny, my opinion is best described as being the polar opposite, crashing through the review like the Polar Express through a snowman.

From a technical perspective, the game is awesome, mind-blowingly so. Yes, it's pretty much still the same GTA ever since it turned 3D - just better, and chock full of references and wink wink nudge nudge moments.

As a piece of interactive art, it's outstanding. There is nothing that even remotely compares to it. People keep mentioning Saint's Row, a series I can enjoy since number 3, but Saint's Row is basically the Hot Shots and Loaded Weapon funny hah-hah knock-off - easy to pick up, fun for a bit, less depth than the piddle of wee in the average hater's pants.

I'm old, I read books and I collect all sorts of shit to make my temporary stay on earth a bit more fun. I like the writing of GTA 5, even if it is mostly served on a self-service basis.

And GTA Online is getting better and more addictive every day.

I play Gran Turismo religiously and I drive a wide range of cars in real life. The handling of vehicles in GTA V is fine. If you know what you like, and if you have a basic grip on physics, driving in GTA V is plenty fun. The flying is also very much OK.

Definitely GOTY material, definitely the one WOW killer in the making a lot of non fantasy unicorn heads have been waiting for.

And just about the same amount of unsavoury subjects as in every online multiplayer community.

Still, GTA V story mode is a must, GTA Online could easily be the next biggest thing in online gaming.

No time to rant now, gotta go steal cars, shoot fellow players from fighter planes and check out what new hairdos I just unlocked.
 

RicoADF

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Jun 2, 2009
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Branindain said:
GTA is the perfect example of why this industry needs its Yahtzees desperately. GTA IV comes out and gets perfect scores and rampant acclaim across the board, and its Metacritic score is higher than should be possible when you consider the broad range of opinion it allegedly represents. Yet nowadays, with the hype long gone, most times I hear GTA IV mentioned, its flaws are being criticised. How is it no-one was professional enough to notice these flaws on a first playthrough? It's pathetic. And now, rather than learn anything, the cycle will begin again. Most frustrating of all, to my mind, are the reviewers who gave GTA IV a 10, and now, in giving GTA V another 10, will happily point out all the areas where it has improved weak points, or fixed problems that existed in the last version WHICH THEY GAVE A PERFECT SCORE.
I enjoyed GTA4 and have enjoyed 5 even moreso, 4 I would say was an 8 and GTAV is probably a 9 to me. It's a subjective view though, I think it's worth that you think its worth less, neither are right or wrong. I think cod is worth 1, but others love it, doesnt make either of us right or wrong.
 

TheUnbeholden

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"Giving us 3 protagonists hoping on the off chance that we would like one of the them".

Of all the people to have missed the point... why did it have to be yahtzee...
Your not supposed to like the protagonists. Your not actually supposed to like anyone in GTA V.

Poorly written and inconsistent characters? That seemed like a rather big hand wave.

All he seems to do is take the points he didn't like about the story (like in the Last of Us) and focus on those points... forgetting to mention all the stuff he did like about it.
Not to mention he forgot to talk about the gameplay, whether the mechanics work, whether it feels solid. All he gave us was "bad airplane controls" but Rockstar did that on purpose. They want flying to be difficult to learn and use.
He also forgot to talk about the controversy surrounding the game and what he thinks about it...

This review just seems really lazy, I was willing to let it slide in The Last of Us because he actually did give us a gameplay round down in that one (stealth mechanics, throwable weapons, AI ect).

Branindain said:
GTA is the perfect example of why this industry needs its Yahtzees desperately. GTA IV comes out and gets perfect scores and rampant acclaim across the board, and its Metacritic score is higher than should be possible when you consider the broad range of opinion it allegedly represents. Yet nowadays, with the hype long gone, most times I hear GTA IV mentioned, its flaws are being criticised. How is it no-one was professional enough to notice these flaws on a first playthrough? It's pathetic. And now, rather than learn anything, the cycle will begin again. Most frustrating of all, to my mind, are the reviewers who gave GTA IV a 10, and now, in giving GTA V another 10, will happily point out all the areas where it has improved weak points, or fixed problems that existed in the last version WHICH THEY GAVE A PERFECT SCORE.
Because the flaws do not detract from the overall experience. Remember a perfect score does not mean a "perfect game". Theres no such thing as a perfect game.

Look at Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, its gotten 5-6 years of unofficial patches, long after Troika died, and it's still is not perfect.

10/10 means its a masterpiece, magnus opus, ie A great work and any flaws are negligible to the overall experience or point of the game.

With that said, GTA IV did still have a slightly inflated score. Hype I suppose, if big enough, can affect a review if the game is a overall good one. Makes the good points seem better than they are and nitpicks get overlooked. Though not always. It seemed like a solid 8/10 to me.
Anyway I think GTA V is probably a 9/10 if I had to make a judgement solely off the gameplay, the story to me gets a 10/10. It was like Kane and Lynch in a open world game.
Sure I didn't like the characters but that didn't stop me from being invested in what happens to the people that get in their way who don't deserve it (or the innocent people whom are related to them that get caught up in the situation). The morals & themes explored, and how they relate to our society... its pretty big points to me.
 

Sidmen

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TheUnbeholden said:
This review just seems really lazy, I was willing to let it slide in The Last of Us because he actually did give us a gameplay round down in that one (stealth mechanics, throwable weapons, AI ect).
Its not a review, its a critique. He's picking out the things he really did like and the things that he didn't like and telling them to us.

As for gameplay? I don't have GTA 5, but he told me exactly what I needed to know in that department. Its identical to all the other GTAs, the flying is still crap and 4's "heavy" cars have been fixed. Tada!
 

webby

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Evonisia said:
Then I will loosely repeat what Yahtzee said about The Conduit, why is the crap option the default one?
The middle ground is the default, just like everything else. Experienced gamers will find the hard lock makes fights trivial whereas newer gamers could find free aim a bit challenging. Decisions like this aren't made on a whim and calling it "the crap one" because it's not your favourite implies a narrow mindedness that permeates this entire thread.

"My opinion is X, ergo X is correct and everyone who thinks/likes Y is wrong."
 

Evonisia

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Jun 24, 2013
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webby said:
Evonisia said:
Then I will loosely repeat what Yahtzee said about The Conduit, why is the crap option the default one?
The middle ground is the default, just like everything else. Experienced gamers will find the hard lock makes fights trivial whereas newer gamers could find free aim a bit challenging. Decisions like this aren't made on a whim and calling it "the crap one" because it's not your favourite implies a narrow mindedness that permeates this entire thread.

"My opinion is X, ergo X is correct and everyone who thinks/likes Y is wrong."
Erm no, that's not my opinion, at all. I said originally that it can't decide whether it's auto-lock on or not. I didn't change any options, half the time it will just auto-lock on an enemy in sight, half the time it made me aim for the enemy myself. As I didn't know of the existence of the button to go all one way or the other, the game itself by default was doing this. A shooting system randomly changing between auto-lock on and free aiming in the same fight as the same character is not good, unless it's intended to challenge players.
 

webby

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Evonisia said:
Erm no, that's not my opinion, at all. I said originally that it can't decide whether it's auto-lock on or not. I didn't change any options, half the time it will just auto-lock on an enemy in sight, half the time it made me aim for the enemy myself. As I didn't know of the existence of the button to go all one way or the other, the game itself by default was doing this. A shooting system randomly changing between auto-lock on and free aiming in the same fight as the same character is not good, unless it's intended to challenge players.
You're exaggerating a problem that has an easy fix. The starting option is basically Aim Assist from CoD with a bit of enemy trailing. If you drag away from the suggested target or hold the trigger down for any notable period of time you end up in free aim, it's a pretty simple/consistent aim mode. I don't really like losing control of my aiming reticule at all so quickly swapped to free aim but it's hardly the schizophrenic system that you suggest.
 

Evonisia

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Jun 24, 2013
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webby said:
You're exaggerating a problem that has an easy fix. The starting option is basically Aim Assist from CoD with a bit of enemy trailing. If you drag away from the suggested target or hold the trigger down for any notable period of time you end up in free aim, it's a pretty simple/consistent aim mode. I don't really like losing control of my aiming reticule at all so quickly swapped to free aim but it's hardly the schizophrenic system that you suggest.
I'm sure it has an easy fix (I've not been on since the day Online launched), but I just don't like it's default as you can probably tell. The comparison to CoD is true (sensitivity goes down when you aim at an enemy) but GTA V's is a bit more extreme than it. However I'm not exaggerating. From memory when I was on the mill mission in the big shootout what I explained actually did happen on several occasions. It also happened during the Grove Street section, among other parts. Each time I was aiming from cover so it's not as if I was running and was trying to aim on the go. Perhaps it's really schizophrenic from cover and not on the move.

I'll probably switch the gun control thing when I go back onto it. That'll be a week of so from now, though.
 

Carpenter

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Mikejames said:
Laughed pretty hard at the closer.
Carpenter said:
Pink Gregory said:
Having more than 2-3 people writing a single character's dialogue is a terrible idea. Even then, it's really one writing and two editing.
So comics are a horrible idea?
You know how many people have written dialog for spiderman? Still manages to be a consistent character.
I'm not sure if any long-running comic book character can claim to be consistent.
That's a joke, right?
Superman, the eternal boy scout. Any time he strays from that path is either for the sake of character development or because of a temporary issue (like mind control or magic) so your argument doesn't really make sense.

If anything, they are too consistent and don't take enough opportunities to develop the characters.

Still, I do love when people that never read comic books try to complain about any aspect of comic books. Either you haven't read many comics or you can't tell the difference between character development and an inconsistent character.
 

Carpenter

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Sidney Buit said:
TheUnbeholden said:
This review just seems really lazy, I was willing to let it slide in The Last of Us because he actually did give us a gameplay round down in that one (stealth mechanics, throwable weapons, AI ect).
Its not a review, its a critique. He's picking out the things he really did like and the things that he didn't like and telling them to us.

As for gameplay? I don't have GTA 5, but he told me exactly what I needed to know in that department. Its identical to all the other GTAs, the flying is still crap and 4's "heavy" cars have been fixed. Tada!
The problem is it's a lazy critique.

He says something about michael thinking he can solve the problem of being rich and depressed by robbing a store and getting more rich. That's not at all what happens in the game, they go on their first heist for a very specific reason that I would rather not spoil for those that haven't played the game. It wasn't just "let's make more money!" in fact I believe there is only one heist in the entire game (with the exception of Trevor's insanity fueled plan) that was done specifically to make them money, even then there is a different reason that Mike suggests it in the first place.

There are plenty of things to nitpick with this game, that's why it comes off as "lazy" when they make up reasons to dislike the game or it's story.

You admit to not playing the game but accuse it of being like every other GTA game. First of all, it's not. If you don't like it, fine, but you never gave it a chance before just assuming that they didn't change anything. Your blind fanboy defense of Yahtzee kind of shows it's face in your comment.
 

Carpenter

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RicoADF said:
Sgt. Sykes said:
Hmm okay, he didn't like it that much I guess.

One thing I don't understand though, why is Saints Row considered 'fun' and the later GTA aren't? Because you can run around with a dildo and other wacky stuff? That's wacky. Not necessarily fun. I didn't play GTAV of course (having only a PC and stuff), but I definitely had tons more fun with GTA IV then SR2+3 combined and if GTA had the same stupid wacky humor everywhere, I'd like it less.
GTAV is best described as GTAIV engine with San Andreas gameplay. I love the game, just as I love Saints Row IV, I play the game I'm in the mood for at the time. But like every game it's not perfect, there are some things people don't like. I haven't had any issues so for me it's perfect, but I'm not going to claim that those that disagree are wrong, it's personal preference.
Yes, no game is perfect, so why not talk about flaws the game actually has instead of making things up for the sake of this video?

It's not just "SA on the GTA 4 engine" and I have to wonder if you even played the game with a comment like that. It's the same engine in a sense but it's been changed in some pretty major ways. On top of that, the gameplay is nothing like SA and I don't even know how you came to that conclusion. Because the city is the same? Even that wouldn't be completely accurate, it's not really the same Los Santos portrayed in SA.
 

Sidmen

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Carpenter said:
Sidney Buit said:
As for gameplay? I don't have GTA 5, but he told me exactly what I needed to know in that department. Its identical to all the other GTAs, the flying is still crap and 4's "heavy" cars have been fixed. Tada!
You admit to not playing the game but accuse it of being like every other GTA game. First of all, it's not. If you don't like it, fine, but you never gave it a chance before just assuming that they didn't change anything. Your blind fanboy defense of Yahtzee kind of shows it's face in your comment.
I hope to high heavens that GTA5 is the same as the other GTAs (with the expected graphical improvements), because that's what pretty much every other reviewer has been telling me, and it's what I want when I finally manage to scrounge up the $60 I'll need to buy the thing. Can you tell me, then, what is different? Is it something that will matter to me, or is it some vague undefined quality that everyone else has missed?
 

Mikejames

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Carpenter said:
Mikejames said:
I'm not sure if any long-running comic book character can claim to be consistent.
That's a joke, right?
Superman, the eternal boy scout. Any time he strays from that path is either for the sake of character development or because of a temporary issue (like mind control or magic) so your argument doesn't really make sense.

If anything, they are too consistent and don't take enough opportunities to develop the characters.

Still, I do love when people that never read comic books try to complain about any aspect of comic books. Either you haven't read many comics or you can't tell the difference between character development and an inconsistent character.
So every mythos of Spiderman has had him make a deal with the Devil or poison Mary Jane with his radioactive sperm?
I think it's safe to say that differing comic writers have taken some liberties.