This fall, Grand Theft Auto V is coming to PC, Xbox One, and PS4.
By all accounts, this won’t be a half-baked console port. Instead, Rockstar is devoting a considerable amount of time and effort to making the next-gen version of the game as amazing as possible.
So far, Rockstar has announced a few cool changes, including more wildlife, more densely populated cities, and graphical enhancements across the board.
That’s good – but we can do better. Here are our top 5 most desired features we want to see on Grand Theft Auto 5 when it finally arrives on PC:
1) Mod-friendly
Just about every game ever made can be modded. However, certain games are more mod-friendly than others.
Grand Theft Auto 4, unfortunately, was not one of those games. GTA IV was difficult to mod and required a relatively complicated mod installation process to get mods to work.
However, that didn’t stop modders from creating some of the craziest mods ever seen on PC. From driving around as a horse to slaughtering civilians while dressed as Woody from Toy Story, the modding potential in Grand Theft Auto games is virtually unlimited.
Hopefully, Rockstar makes its game more mod-friendly than previous titles. GTA IV’s mods were amazing – what could modders do with a game that was actually mod-friendly?
If Rockstar is really smart, then they’ll attempt to bring mods to console gamers. Maybe give them mods via free or cheap DLC? Console gamers would lose their minds.
2) New songs to freshen things up
Other potential areas of improvement include new songs – those who have already spent hundreds of hours driving around Los Santos have heard every song and radio bit in the game. In previous games, like Episodes from Liberty City, Rockstar switched in new songs among the old ones, providing a nice refresher.
3) Police, ambulance, and taxi missions
Sometimes, running people over all day gets old. Sometimes, I feel the need to redeem myself by performing some good deeds.
In GTA V, there’s no good in-game way to do that. However, GTA: Vice City memorably had police, ambulance, and taxi missions. Players could click R3 while driving the ambulance to instantly become a paramedic.
You could go around town rescuing people and make the city better. It’s been a while since we’ve seen that in a GTA game, but it would be a nice touch.
4) Visit North Yankton
As far as I know, a Grand Theft Auto game has never featured snow. That’s why fans of the series were pleasantly surprised by North Yankton, the snow-covered East Coast area of the game where several notable campaign moments take place.
North Yankton, however, was forever closed to the public: you can use a glitch to get to North Yankton in GTA: Online, but it’s not officially sanctioned by Rockstar.
5) Fast loading times
GTA: 5 is a huge, complex game. That’s why it takes so long to load on consoles. Fortunately, players don’t usually have to view loading screens in-game unless you’re going between missions. However, there are certain times when you’re driving in the wilderness and the game will briefly pause to render distant trees and hills.
On next-gen consoles, let’s hope loading times aren’t crazy long. If they are crazy long, then at least make sure they load the entire environment – I don’t mind waiting through one long loading screen, but waiting through multiple loading screens could be annoying.