At the moment, I am doing New Vegas hudless run (VNV modlist + JSUE Tweak) on my spare times. Honestly I am adore it due to the fact it feels like 3D Fallout 2 as previously I run my playthroughs using hud. However this also makes you need to be perceptive as on this tweaked game raider tends to ambush you so you kind of develop second nature of how you perceive surrounding on Mojave. Even though people may thinking hudless does not make a sense, it simply each on theit own enjoyment as you cannot please everyone with same tricks every single time.
Although not hudless, but in GTA San Andreas I can notice a landmark or a spot of the map just from a pictures. It feels like ingrained on my mind from my countless hour doing SP as kids and playing SAMP during my teenage years.
To put it simply, people nowaday spoiled with choices while they wanted needlessly to be served what they want.
Back in earlier gaming era (90s and 00s), console exclusive and PC exclusive is a thing and no one even complain, people back then accept the fact that mostly game are only available on Consoles, and those that released on Computer are mostly Online/LAN games or MMOs, This trend continue until late 00s where some of console games get ported to PC because there is demand.
Pushing through 10s, PC is relevant as the cost of the system is almost same (or even cheaper) compared to the console, back then you can build gaming pc out of dell optiplex and slap a 750 or 750 Ti and you’ll get something similar to PS4/XONE performance. Once it gets to late 10s where entry price of PC is a bit high (you can thank Intel for keeping re-releasing 14nm up to 6 generations and then Ryzen came) if you want to have more FPS and prettier graphics on PC.
Now in the 20s, we have tons of hardware variation that can play a game ranging from components from 2014 that still holding up although struggling to get 30/60fps, to something workspace component that can run games 144 FPS+ on casual games. Heck you can even run game without owning the hardware by streaming them (GeForce Now)
In my opinion these people probably those who back then owned consoles and jump ship to PC and expecting same treatment as console player. And of course you cannot guarantee A PC (without specify its components) to run games as much as I encountered some kids tried to run AAA games on their school laptops that had Intel Celeron with dinky 4GB of RAM, while on console it is definite to run as it was mean to run games.
Yeah, to put it constructive criticism, seeing Rockstar re-releasing GTA V three times that makes people mad is understandable, but to be fair people who owned PS4/PS5 that want to play GTA V/Online back then no way they would patch backward compatibility themselves specifically on PS4, the difference was “night and day” compared on PS3. While I did not have newer console upward from PS2, I would treat those improvement and the online availability as service that runs by R* and legally they able to charge you (but the end decision was on each own right?).
Simply to be put, if someone want to blame whom, blame the system and the people. These entities follows business rule and they serve from the demand, as funny as it sounds the demand is from each individual, that’s why vote with your wallet is make sense for consumable product, similar to (underaged) children who play games and spending their parents CC, the parent is to put the blame because they could not control their kid or even bother to parenting.
As much as I understand the disappointment, from development point I tolerate them as Rockstar ever since they had their own in house Game Engine, they does not shoehorn the game into a mess of unplayablility (see common AAA studios). Not to mention those jack of all trade engine (e.g UE, Unity, CryEngine) while you can make the project multiplatform, the optimization that need to be done is far more time consuming (reading the docs of the SDK) compared to an Engine you build your own, an example of this on recent release is Yakuza Ishin, Ishin use Unreal Engine and run worse compared to every Yakuza games they released prior (which they did use their in-house game Engine).
Rockstar made it clear focus on to deliver console optimization on front ever since GTA III released (technical standpoint see GTA San Andreas on PS2, GTA V on PS3 and X360, Max Payne 3 on console).
Even though from PS4/XONE we have x86 arch console, the uniformity of console specs leads the easy to work on optimization rather than plethora of hardwares that available on Personal Computer space.
Maybe I am sounded defending Rockstar but I gave my opinion from my past experience as game modder so knowing those SDK a bit. If you want to blame, you can blame the higher up on T2 since those parties the one tied up the Rockstar (R* owned by T2). I do have a share of disappointment when they took down the Reverse Engineered code of 3D era gta codes, but that incident also have grey area as some says that some portion of the code are part of original code.
This is the apparent problem that mostly not most of the victim (consumerism) aware, especially those who have large amount of expendable fund, or someone who bored enough that they dont have alternative time consuming activity other than gaming.
As someone who once was console player (ps1 - ps2), I can say console exclusive game have their own merit, however lots of thing happen, ranging from the source code is lost, to higher up management are fucking boomer (me as SMT fans waiting for PC port is miraculous, even Persona spin off released on steam is something, yet they milked it off right away).
Heck even if you had something like Hideo Kojima (starting from MGS V) or Toshiro Nagoshi (former RGG Studio head who made decision to bring some of SEGA games into PC and into the West, and the one who revived Yakuza popularity in the west), they released their game on PC too because they cared for their fans but somehow higherup may blocking those (Japanese back then did not view PC gaming as main gaming entertainment, only niche stuff fill these in for example Simracing, Self publish game, H-game VN).
Back to the topic, It depends on each of their own view, but for me I just game whatever I had and what I want to be fun. I don’t need to get pushed by someone forced opinion (e.g hype) to enjoy a game rather I just enjoy a media based on interest. (source: me who tried to enjoy NFS Payback, as much as the fanbase shunned it because its controversy and radical change, I did find some fun here and there, from my own playthrough I find the game is flawed and noticed that the Ghost Game simply did NFS by the book (or perhaps pressured by EA for profit) and thats why they could not flawlessly release NFS Heat).
As someone who games solely on pc nowaday simply because having other things to do, I don’t mind waiting even more so the chance I will get it on launch day is null.
Remember fellas vote with your wallet, do not get blinded by hypetrain.
As someone who back in 2010s up to 2016 regularly visits gtaforums to discuss modding and waiting for gta v pc release, I can say no. People back in 2015 launch had issues ranging from simply unable to launch, infinite loading screen, close to the desktop, to missing graphical effects (even after driver update).
In term of recent gta release, gta v definitely is more optimized in a sense but if your information based on something like Digital Foundry retrospective videos… Well idk, since they tested it with “optimized” setting and not in launch version.
In a sense of gritty crime story telling? Yeah I’d agree. Things that make SR1 & 2 differs from GTA is that they dont shy away from goofiness and let players having fun with lots of side activity but at same time they also have coherent direction where the story heading at (like Yakuza series).
Though I would be more cautious in writing as the only veteran staff of GTA creation that stays on Rockstar is Sam Houser. Dan Houser (his brother), Leslie Benzies and some others key people had leave Rockstar games due to some internal issues as far as I know.
Rockstar historically always have delayed pc port, and issues on launch for their pc release. Maybe 2026 is more on reality (gta 4 pc port is released in less than a year, and it was the worst performing gta on pc iirc).
I’m more interested of how much satire, sarcasm, irony and parody they bring into gta 6. Not really care about graphics since whats shaping up gta is the satirical of the world especially usa.
If they still keep those in check on release, rockstar still had the balls.
Even though it is coming from rockstar main studios, I just hope it won’t be end up like Saints Row reboot which turn out become massive joke and the volition had to close up lmao.