It was still massively overhyped. After beating the story mode I am just not that impressed with GTA V. Don't get me wrong I think its a good game and its a big improvement on 4 but a lot of what was being hyped turned out to not be half as good as it seemed.

*possible spoilers ahead.*

First off... the map is actually not that big. Yes, maybe its technically the biggest map Rockstar has ever done but most of it is filler. There is one city that is about the same size as liberty city from 4 and the rest is empty woodland mountain areas. That wouldn't be that bad if those mountain areas were even half as engaging as the ones in red dead redemption... but they are not. The wildlife is minimal and you won't really come across many other people there. San Andreas felt bigger and more diverse than GTA V. There were three fully fleshed out cities. GTA V only has one.

# 2. The heists are underwhelming. This was one of the most hyped aspects of the game and it fell flat for me. When I first heard about heists I thought the game was going to give us freedom to really plan the heists on our own and execute it as we see fit. It turns out the heists were really just heavily scripted linear missions with slight deviations based on certain choices you make. They were fun and all but at the end of the day they were just missions like any other missions. In San Andreas there were home invasions. Sure those weren't intricate and sophisticated heists but they weren't heavily scripted either and imo they were more fun.

#3. Three protagonists actually hurts the game. It seemed like a good idea at first but in practice having three protagonists actually takes away some of the magic that I felt in previous gta's, particularly San Andreas. There was an RPG aspect to San Andreas that really gave that game a lot of longevity for me. There is also RPG aspects in this game but with three protagonists I never really felt like I got invested in just one of them. On a side note the skills didn't seem to mean much. Unlike in GTA:SA I never actually felt like my skills were improving. My driving stat would go up for characters but it never actually felt like there was much of a difference in my actual driving ability.

#4. The story wasn't up to Rockstar standards. This relates to #3 because I think three protagonists contributed to this. You definitely do lose out on a lot of the interesting side characters GTA games usually have and overall the story just lacked the gravitas of Red Dead or atleast the interesting escalation and progression of GTA:SA. Half of the story just ended up being Michael and Trevor bickering like an old married couple and that got really tired after a while. Oh and the ending was WEAK!!! Super anti-climatic. I was actually shocked when the credits rolled... it was the worst ending of any gta game. There was no twist or epic showdown, just a mission that played out like a dozen missions before it. Compare that ending to the end of GTA:SA. That was an epic ending with the entire city delving into chaos, stunt jumps, action set pieces and an epic showdown of "good" vs "evil". GTA V on the other hand was just tying up loose ends.

#5. Limited side activities. Another heavily hyped aspect of the game was how much there was to do in the world. There are a lot of things to do in the world, but the problem is most of those things are just not very compelling. Instead of focusing on crap like Tennis, golf and yoga, rockstar should have focused more on the empire building activities that are more likely to hold peoples interest for longer. In GTA:SA I spent hours just grabbing homies to roll on some ballas until I turned all of los santos green. Then I would ride up to San Fiero and perform another hostile takeover, all the while trying to keep the territories I had already grabbed. That was fun, a lot more fun than virtual yoga. And before GTA IV ruined it, going on dates was actually a pretty fun diversion in GTA: SA as well. Side activities in Red Dead were also far more compelling. I could literally spend hours playing the card games or hunting. Being able to clear out gang hideouts was also very satisfying. Another open world game with brilliant empire building was The Godfather II.

#6. Online is trying to do too much. Let me just say that the GTA V character creation for online is the worst I have ever seen bar none. How on earth did they ever think that was a good idea? But besides that (not even taking into account all the technical issues) I just don't see the point to all the overly ambitious nonsense they have thrown into online. I finally got online today and instead of jumping into a sandbox to have fun I get a pointless cutscene and a forced race tutorial. I guarantee the most fun anyone is going to have in GTA online is just going to be playing in the sandbox and wreaking havoc with friends. So why do we need cutscenes and story missions? Waste of time and resources if you ask me. They'd be better off using those resources to give us more tools and toys in the sandbox.

Sorry for the long posts. These are just my opinions. I'll probably get flamed for stating that GTA V is less than perfect but I don't hate this game (Unlike GTA IV which I genuinely despise) I just don't think its the best GTA game ever and its not nearly as good as the hype would have you believe.

I agree, really amazing detailed world, but much of the game is......not done that well. Adding a lot of content for the sake of it has its draw backs, many aspects are pointless (LIke darts) , Business ownership is really underdeveloped, etc...

Online is a disaster.

GTA has always been massively overrated, this one is no different.

I've been very disappointed with the lack of options in multiplayer and I just wasted a bunch of money because I figured the 120k apartment would have a heist board. Also why can't we just steal cars? Why do the police know which cars have been stolen? Just sees like a stupid annoyance that sucks the fun out of the game online for the same of "realism" no one wants

I like you. A good game but nothing groundbreaking and somewhat shallow. Did less for its time than even GTAIV. And as far as story and characters go I'd probably put GTAIV>GTAV and Niko>Trevor>Franklin>Michael.

Driving and shooting were great though.

Oh and Red Dead was a far better game for its time.

The shooting and driving is the main reason why I prefer it over IV. Gameplay is ofcourse the most important aspect of a game and IV had really really bad gameplay. Driving was a nightmare and shooting was awkward and annoying. GTA V fixed those problems so the game is actually fun to play and control at the very least. But what V didn't fix is Rockstar still going more and more into the linear direction and not giving players the kind of freedom they had in GTA's before IV.

And yeah, Red Dead was a game I enjoyed far more than GTA V.

Rockstar is trying to exert way too much control in multiplayer. You can't steal cars because they want you to buy them, and even though they won't outright say it, they want more people to spend real money on in-game-cash. The ambitious aspects of GTA online sounded good on paper but I am skeptical that rockstar can actually pull it off. They are not very experienced with this kind of thing.

Heists are coming later

I think that the game is brilliant and if I was to reccomend a GTA game to play, I would reccomend V, but it didn't have that same magic of Vice City and San Andreas. I have spent 50 hours there and really enjoyed it, I did actually enjoy the countryside, just riding around on a sanchez is great fun.

The story is lackings something. I think the problem is that it never goes anywhere, you feel like there is basically only 1 storyline. The side missions are alright, but you kind of feel that they are meant to be replacements for the other random main missions, but they don't quite match up to what you would want.

I have barely played Online, but I feel there is something there, even if I'm not sure what it is. The races are quite fun, the deathmatches are quite fun, but I haven't found anything too special yet. I do feel that if I got a group of 4+ players together, we could have great fun, especially when the heists arrive... It could be great to have your own character going through a GTA story, but at the moment is just seems kind of muddled what is going on

What I'm really hoping for is a single player Las Venturas/San Fierro DLC with an Oceans 11 style heist

You're right. Making the game way to damn easy was the solution. Not a good one. The driving stats barely increase your driving, you're already awesome at it. The auto-aim is absolutely terrible. You just scroll from enemy to enemy using your d-pad and trigger. No thumbstick required when they're all out in the open. It even tracks through walls partially and cars.

The abilities each character to get was way overpowered. You can slow time with 2 of them. What's the point of cheats? Rockstar threw them in for us. Just click the joysticks and off you go. They don't even take long to charge either making a rampage that much easier... I still think it's a great game though. Groundbreaking? No where near.

GTA is still far behind their third person shooting peers. Its no gears of war and its no uncharted when it comes to shooting mechanics, but I kind of accept that. All I really wanted was the shooting/walking/cover to be tolerable. It went from unbearable in IV to tolerable in V. I accept that because shooting has never been great in the GTA series.

I actually did try to play without auto-aim and it didn't work out. I could never find the enemies so I ended up playing most of the game with auto aim and yes, that really takes away any sense of challenge or tension. Your basically just on cruise control. Surprisingly I didn't have this issue with Red Dead. I played that game without auto-aim and the shoot outs were actually pretty enjoyable. Not sure why V fell short here when Red Dead got it right.

The only special ability I ever found useful was Franklins. Michael and Trevors were just pointless. I found Trevor's special ability actually made shootouts more annoying while not really helping much.

Right on queue, as with every big launch.

Haven't played the game, not planning on it anytime soon, but saw this coming. Right on time too.