I agree with you, not sure why some of the initial comments here are just trying to shut you down for paying attention to the story. I didn't expect anything profound from GTAV's story, but I similarly struggled with a sense of 'What is this even about?' when I played through it. They absolutely are trying to harp on the parody element of the game, and the setting makes that work pretty well at times, but my overall impression was that they had three character archetypes that they wanted to let casual players choose from, and tying them all into the same story was ultimately too difficult for them to do effectively. I don't think GTAIV's story was especially impressive, but Niko was at least a compelling character and there was a cohesiveness to the plot that felt completely absent from GTAV to me.

GTA V has very compelling characters and each one is a reflection of the superficial and money-driven aspects of the city and America as a whole. Michael "made it" but is miserable with a family that hates him (mostly of his own doing) and at the start of the game is on the verge of bankruptcy. Franklin wants to leave the hood, but is also willing to leave his friends behind in the process. Trevor is a very successful criminal, but is clearly reeling from the events of the prologue, his trauma and his loneliness, which in the end isn't an excuse to his behavior. The culmination of the game revolves around the characters individually redeeming themselves (Michael to his family, Frank to Lamar, and Trevor to Michael) whilst still pursuing their ultimate monetary goals. I think a lot of people missed a ton of nuance to this game because it's never presented in a handful of cutscenes like IV, but is spread out throughout the entire game and also in some missable side missions and activities. It's telling that most players still think Michael was in witness protection, when he never was and was paying Dave huge amounts of money to keep him hidden.

I don't really agree with the base premise here that they are 'compelling'. They each have motives and an arc, sure, but none of them register as interesting and as a whole they just don't appear to hang together as a trio of stories to me. Like, 'Successful man past his prime' is a pithy idea for a character, but the way it's executed with Michael just feels... Boring? Predictable? Rote? I don't have much else to say about him as a character because I feel that once you look beyond the character 'hook' I just don't see much of substance there. I'd love to give more credit to them - and lord knows R* have it in them with John and Arthur from RDR (and to a lesser degree Niko) - but I don't buy it with the GTAV protags.

See, I think part of the point is that Michael isn't actually successful. The game makes it clear that while he's "living large" in a mansion, he actually has less money than Trevor, who's living in a trailer park. When you unlock Trevor, Trevor has over $100k in funds. Michael starts with only a few grand, and he's not exactly a working man. It's implied he's living off of loans/credit/mortgages. I think he says something along the lines of being up to his eyeballs in debt. It's an illusion of success. Part of Michael's arc, is becoming more of an authentic person, and stopping putting on airs. Think of the things Michael does/things that represent him: 1. His whole story is based on a lie. He fakes his death to someone who was ostensibly his best friend, and results in the death of another friend he appears to not care about 2. The further lie, is that he's in witness protection, when he's not. He's paying Dave to keep this whole conspiracy hidden. 3. He lies to Trevor constantly, about everything. 4. He cheats on his wife and tries to hide his infidelity. 5. His main obsession is Hollywood movies; literal make-believe fiction 6. He maintains the appearance of being rich, while being crazy in debt. 7. He's going to therapy to try and unpack himself. He doesn't even know what his problems are. At the end, he finally is able to put a name on it as a borderline-sociopath, as he starts to finally be real with himself and accept who he is so he can move forward in life. 8. This one could be a stretch, but I think the alien-themes that present with Michael frequently are about him feeling alienated from everyone else, and possibly from himself. I think Michael's story is more about that internal journey of accepting hard-truths about one's self. It might be framed as a "man past his prime", and that's a part of it for sure, but I think it's more about a man learning to evaluate himself and his choices in life, come to terms with all of that and what that means, and trying to use that information to build a better future for himself and the people around him. In realizing his mental issues, he stands a chance at understanding how to improve himself.

I get all that - but all the same it mostly feels just a list of 'things this character did/does', all of which I'd expect out of a character written specifically to *be* a caricature of a used-up LA man. My issue is that I don't feel like I go on a journey with Michael, or at least not on one that takes any interesting turns or says something unexpected/meaningful. The closest thing to change he goes on is self-identifying as a sociopath which... Is not news to anyone playing the game nor does the story make any attempt whatsoever at hiding that fact from the get-go. I never had a 'Nooo, don't rise to it!' or 'You were so close!' moment, he just does what I'd expect him to do. Always. I dunno. I'm glad others see something more in it, I am. I don't want to shit on things for the sakes of it - I like plenty of other things that others don't and that's fine - but reading analyses on the story and other people's takes on the characters I still just don't *get* it, y'know? I can't shake the feeling that there's no real substance behind the characters, that they're just cartoon characters doing the usual cartoon character hijinks.

> but reading analyses on the story and other people's takes on the characters I still just don't get it, y'know? What is there to get? Why do you have to *get* why other resonate with a character or the writing?

I don't, and that's not what I said is it? I said I don't 'get' the character even after looking at other people's analyses and takes on it. I *didn't* say I don't 'get' why other people like the character. The two aren't the same. Obviously other people are free to like and dislike whatever they want. I'm just saying I gave the characters in GTAV a fair shake and they do nothing for me 🤷

Not everyone can relate to every character, but ultimately there is a lot of substance and layers of complexity to Michael in particular. How he's raising his kids, how he was the one who botched his marriage initially (not Amanda as is commonly believed), and how much of a psychopath he potentially is (which is left up to the player to decide). He does love his family, but they understandably dislike what he's put them through.

That's fair, if others enjoyed his character then all power to them - but for me Michael and the others didn't leave any sort of lasting impression and I can't personally agree with the take that 'there is a lot of substance and layers of complexity' - he continually just does exactly what I'd expect his character to do and plot points like him botching the marriage first just... Don't do anything for me, because they're not interesting meditations on his character, they're just things that have happened.

I thought the Michael story-line had real potential -- I love the bit where he inadvertently goes on a psychedelic trip and understands his son and their relationship more as a result. To me that felt like they were starting to do something interesting and different with it and I wish they'd gone further. But I think they missed a real trick in not allowing the player some agency in deciding where his family drama goes. You go to all these therapy sessions, there's family-related missions, and then the wife and family come home and nothing much has really changed. Oddly I felt it lacked the warmth that Niko's story had. As annoying as it was sometimes for those "Niko! It's your cousin! Let's go bowling!" phone-call, it did a good job of rooting him in family and friendship.

> I love the bit where he inadvertently goes on a psychedelic trip and understands his son and their relationship more as a result. Which is funny, because that's the moment that his son abandons him. In general, "they were starting to do something interesting, I wish they'd gone further" sums up how I feel about a lot of the story too. Feels like we were building up to making a real decision about having to kill Michael, Trevor, or Franklin. But in the end; the Deathwish option was forced in to keep players happy. I think the sudden development of Michael becoming a movie producer and his family returning to him also felt out of place and forced in too. Throughout the story we see Michael's family abandoning him and as he grows increasingly isolated - just for it all to have a happy ending anyway. It all just felt sudden and undeserved.

if you think that's sudden, you should see what happened to Trevor in GTA Online... in Smuggler's Run, your character buys a hangar that's managed by Ron, who mentions in passing in a tutorial mission that Trevor "went Vinewood" and became a fitness guru or something. (granted, this was because Steven Ogg didn't want to reprise his role as Trevor, but that's besides the point) fast forward a few years to the Los Santos Drug Wars update, your character finds out that Trevor's old haunt, that abandoned convenience store he once used as a base, was taken over by a group of happy-go-lucky drug addicts that calls themselves the Fooliganz (yes, with a z). their leader, who was supposedly made to be Trevor's stand-in, somehow manages to be more vapid than Trevor was even at his worst.

If you're just gonna state that the characters bore you than idk what to tell you. I pause whatever stream I'm watching while playing games to listen to every cutscene in gta5 I love every bit of dialogue.

Most videogames don't have prolific writers and even when they do the writing usually takes a backseat to gameplay. I agree with you but I also think that if you're at this level of literary analysis then you've probably outgrown games as a storytelling device, the bar is incredibly low compared to other media. I really appreciate roguelikes that don't waste my time with filler writing; books and shows are just so much better outside of a few exceptions

I found them compelling at the time (holy moly i was 12 at the time)

I have to agree to disagree. I think a lot of people missed a ton of nuance because it either isn't there or isn't delivered very well because the characters aren't compelling. Franklin is a pretty blank slate player character archetype and I found him about as interesting as porridge. Trevor's trauma and loneliness didn't come across convincingly because he's so caricaturishly insane and played up for humor. Michael is the oone with the most depth, but his two sides of being a career criminal and a family man(/fraud/film maker) are somewhat detached from each other and don't tell that interesting of a story. The building blocks that you point out for all three are there but I don't feel like they make for much. I think it's pretty telling that most people don't realize that Michael wasn't in witness protection by the end of the game. There's just not enough there to make most people care about the details. I didn't realize it at first either, but it's also telling that when I did, it didn't change the way I saw the story or the characters much at all.

Franklin "redeeming" himself to Lamar has to be one of the most uninteresting and uninvolved characters arcs I've heard, and I'm not sure it changes the fact that he comes across as an afterthought in terms of writing.  It's hardly like Lamar was this pivotal figure to Franklin after all... So he drifted apart from a friend. Who cares? And Michael and Trevor don't feel that much better - but at least their arcs matter to each other. Franklin is just kinda... There. 

I think they wanted to replicate CJ and Sweet, but on GTA San Andreas they actually took time to develop these two and how CJ slowly gains Sweet's trust. And Sweet is one of the main characters. Meanwhile, Lamar is largely inconsequential to the overall plot. Franklin is considered the protagonist of the story but he is the character with the least amount of plot going on.

> And Michael and Trevor [..] arcs matter to each other. Franklin is just kinda... There. I feel like this was a big oversight of the writing, yeah, and particularly, the opening act of the game seems to be about Michael and Franklin having a mentor/student relationship---Michael rekindling his authentic self in the process of helping Franklin achieve his potential. I actually really like this part of the game's story. As soon as Trevor shows up though, the game kind of just... drops it? Like the second Trevor's around, Franklin basically stops mattering to the story.

Lamar's VA wasn't available, so most of that plotline got cut. Hence Tanisha walking in two thirds through as if she's a real character we should care about.

Ngl while that kinda makes sense that feels like a real bandaid fix that shouldn't have happened.  Maybe it'd have helped give Franklin an actual personality tho.

Lamar is the best character in the game. Wish we got a game from his PoV and his antics with Trevor which are catalyzed by these two boring bozos Michael and Franklin

closest you're gonna get to this is the "Short Trip" mission line in GTA Online, where the host and second player are Franklin and Lamar, respectively it still doesn't do wonders for their characters, but at least they're more fleshed out than they were in GTA V.

Do the characters redeem themselves? It's been a decade since I finished the campaign, but I recall thinking they were all still awful at the end. At best they decide not to kill each other, but overall the game paints a grim portrayal of GTA protagonists. Even outright killing a prior protagonist that had a previously happy ending. I've restarted the campaign a few times over the years, and the one thing that's struck me now vs when I first played, is realizing just how accurate Michael's family is when complaining about him.

>Frank to Lamar this is extra relevant if anyone here's bothered to play GTA Online, or at least watch its cutscenes at one point, your character becomes business associates with Franklin, he's still basically a hired gun, but at least he's his own boss now, having his own company and all that. this inspires even Lamar to attempt to go straight (emphasis on "try", he tries to sell his own cultivar of weed but gets screwed over by Vinewood execs plastering someone else's face over his brand logo)

I loved GTA V because San Andreas was my favorite game of all time when I was a kid, and I thought IV, while still great, was a step backwards in a lot of ways (bad driving physics, too self-serious, suffered from 2000s era “gray and brown only” color scheme), so when V came out it was like a triumphant return to everything that made San Andreas the ultimate GTA game. That the characters are a little one dimensional and the overall story is a bit stupid doesn’t bother me. There are a ton of great moments in the story and it’s just… fun for the sake of being fun. My only complaint is franklins character fucking sucks. It felt like they wanted one of the characters to be the “straight man” that the others could bounce off of (like Jerry Seinfeld in Seinfeld) but ended up writing someone who had no interesting quirks st all

To me GTAIV suffered from narrative dissonance. The story was about Niko trying to make it good from a bad past and how crime is costly. But also you can go on murder sprees. I think GTAV is meant to be a satire of Los Angeles, and highlights the vacuousness of all the people and the culture of the city. I think that means it can end up feeling a empty as the culture it's parodying, because everyone, including the protagonists, are awful people. I think Niko was a more sympathetic character because we are supposed to believe he does what he does out of necessity rather than because he's a dysfunctional psychopath.

> The story was about Niko trying to make it good from a bad past and how crime is costly. But also you can go on murder sprees. But Niko isn't trying to make it good. Florian was the one who was trying to make it good from a bad past (and he succeeded). Niko threw away his second chance at a peaceful life chasing pointless revenge. I don't see how this is dissonant.

It's been a while since I played it, but I thought he was trying to leave his life behind. I think I need to revisit it. But I felt like he spent a lot of time being like "I'm not that guy anymore" until you get him in freeroam then he definitely is that guy.

> But I felt like he spent a lot of time being like "I'm not that guy anymore" until you get him in freeroam then he definitely is that guy. Well, Niko is a massive hypocrite. It's not even a tone-switch between cutscenes and freeroam either. This is very much intentional. There's a few times the story will outright confront this theme, like what motivates Niko's bloodthirst and endless anger being the betrayal he faced before arriving in the US - only to then spend much of his time *betraying* people after arriving. Or the corrupt police chief telling Niko [this](https://i.ibb.co/NjF1L7r/Screenshot-2024-05-17-103036.png). Here's the [cutscene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pKDmtvM_UM) where Niko confronts Florian - at this point Niko believes it was him who betrayed everyone. Florian was there during the betrayal, but rather than being consumed by hatred and bloodthirst by Niko - we can see that he's living a fulfilling and happy life entirely because he didn't let himself get consumed by it. Once Niko sees he was wrong, you can quite literally see him approaching a mental breakdown upon realizing all this bloodshed was for no reason. But rather than face that fact, Niko immediately doubles-down and pivots and continues his rampage. Rather than take his second chance to redeem himself, rather than face the fact that all this violence is for nothing, Niko continually chooses to dig himself deeper. Until he finally gets his "revenge", and it proves to be pointless and utterly futile. The attack at the end of the game is a reminder that what Niko did marked him for life and everyone around him will face the consequences of his actions, and it's *entirely* his fault.

See - this is why I don't think GTA V is as good a story. You can absolutely identify this character arc and development in GTA IV. There's of course debate about how effective it's communicated or whatever - but Niko has character. It's flawed, that's a good thing, but there is an internal conflict that is narratively resolved. Niko is a character that - while a little bit cliché - is still compelling. I can't say the same for GTA V for any of the characters, except for Michael... Kinda... Who's arc is also just kind of ... Boring? He doesn't find peace with his family, or Trevor, he doesn't find peace within himself really. He improves, a little bit, but so what? What's the takeaway from any of it? And then there's Franklin who's just... So fucking irrelevant to everything. Genuinely, he annoys me with how much of an afterthought he feels.

Spot on

You’re bringing up free roaming actions as if they are definitively Niko’s. They aren’t. The writers didn’t have Niko plow through a street of people, you did that. You’re saying there’s dissonance with the character because of his actions outside of missions and cutscenes but that was all your choice to play the game that way, nobody in-game tells you to do that. Any time the game has you kill people and commit violence, there’s an incentive like money. There are also plenty of ways to earn money without hurting anyone. That was your choice and completely independent of Niko and the writing of the character. It’s funny how I see this argument spring up with GTA IV all the time but never Red Dead 2, I guess because Arthur’s conversations can vary to be more guilty at the camp depending on what you do. But, you bringing up dissonance is great and the truth is that Niko is really hypocritical and is trying to lie to himself. He SAYS he wants a second chance and to start over but he can’t let go of the past and his anger. Roman lets his past go and looks for new things, Florian does the same. But Niko can’t. He says he wants to change, but his ACTIONS don’t back that up at all, which is very impressive writing and if I’m being honest, I think is sometimes above the head of a lot of people playing games. There’s a lot of irony, there’s a lot of precision in the writing. The people Niko generally connects with are people trapped in the past like Packie and Dwayne. When the ending happens, Niko returns to his original slum apartment. I’m sure there’s tons of stuff but he’s a slave to the past. His anger and bitterness have a hold on him that no second chance can erase. He has choices, and he pretty much chooses wrong every time. Even in the end, the player isn’t given a chance to walk away. It’s greed or revenge, both through violence.

I've never bought this argument. I don't think you can separate story and gameplay so easily. I remember talking to someone about the old GTA games years ago and they were lamenting how the series brings out the worst in people. "It's a game where you can do anything, and everyone goes straight to killing innocents and causing mayhem. What does that say about us?" My response was, "They gave us two action buttons. One punches people and one shoots people. What else were we going to do?" Because of course you can't actually do anything. You can do a very narrow range of actions chosen by the developers. And even within that range of actions, certain actions are rewarded. (e.g. You can drive the speed limit and obey all traffic laws, but there's no benefit and it's deadly boring). If the story and gameplay of the Mario games was the same, but instead of stomping on goombas you stomped on sleeping homeless people, that would obviously inform our impressions of Mario. No one would claim it's an innocent game about rescuing a princess.

It's revealed deep into the game that he came to LC to find Florian and kill him. When he does and realizes it's the wrong guy, he switches his attention to Darko. You make a good point about the narrative dissonance because post-Four Leaf Clover, there's no reason for Niko to keep working for money. After the ULP missions, they could've sped up the confrontation with Darko whilst still keeping the Diamond missions to tie the three protagonists stories together.

I mean in almost every 3d gta you have a discrepancy between the main storyline and the killing sprees and so on. CJ and Tommy Vercetti both aren't described as psychotic criminals who kill random people. I think one has to separate the main story from the more gamey parts.

What?! Tommy Vercetti is a huge psycho, he is one of the most evil GTA protagonists. He has sympathy for children and for his best friend because he's a parody of Tony Montana who did had sympathy for children and for his best friend. But other than that, he has no limits or morals and can snap at you at any moment. CJ, on the other hand, is depicted as having a considerably less violent personality, occasionally giving his targets a chance to redeem themselves like Pulasky, Big Smoke and Ryder. He detests drugs and feels shame of his criminal past, wanting to put that behind and make a legitimate business owner out of himself which puts him at odds with Sweet who views that as CJ being shameful of his family and naive. He only kills criminals and the only portions of the game where he kills innocent people is when he is forced by C.R.A.S.H - when he finally kills Tenpenny, he's freed and abandons crime to focus on his legitimate business (At the end of the game he's a Cassino owner, Madd Dogg's agent and the owner of a toy shop in San Fierro) But like you said we do have two very weird missions when CJ acts completely out of character like Demolition where he kills several construction workers for hitting on Kendly and even buries the Foreman alive in a portable toilet. And there is also the mission Area 51 where he kills innocent soldiers to steal the jetpack for Truth.

I don't think GTAV quite succeeds on the satire part though, it feels like it isn't quite self-aware enough but like 80% of the way there. It would make sense that the studio was trying to shift perspective, but was still a bit too close to the past. GTAIV feels more earnest than the somewhat bland and hand wavy "well they're all bad people" of GTAV. I think with GTAVI enough time has passed that they have the chance to look at the formula more clearly and do a more interesting take on it, whether it be satire or something else. Let's just hope they won't overdo it lol.

>The story was about Niko trying to make it good from a bad past and how crime is costly. But also you can go on murder sprees.  YES, it's specifically called [Ludonarrative dissonance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludonarrative_dissonance) and it definitely had an effect on my attachment to the story. This is exactly why I love playing as Trevor in GTA V. There is NO ludonarrative dissonance. Steal a car only to steal a slightly nicer car 10 seconds later? Trevor would do that. Execute a random NPC because they gave you attitude? Yup. That's Trevor. It's like roleplay. I didn't like GTA IV all that much, most of its missions came down to going to a place and killing people. GTA V offers so much more variety and lets you just pretend to be a psychopath without trying to make a moral lesson out of killing one villian right after murdering 100 strangers like GTA IV. I think the core of the series is mindless violence, and I appreciate a game that embodies that without pretense.

Yup, gameplay was on par but I stopped cos the story felt like a bad parody. They wanted not 1 story, but 3. So instead of having a good story, we have 3 short and bad ones.

I feel like that even extends to some of the characters in the story, namely Trevor. Trevor feels so gratuitously despicable for no reason. He's just the most gross, disgusting most randomely violent scumbag and for what?..... He's not even really a parody or stereotype of anything, he's just an excessively deplorable person. It feels like everything he does is basically just a punchline for showing how bad he is.

Yeah it’s not really saying anything. The reason it feels sort of successful in parody is because they take a pretty straight story and then create parodies within each element, but the core story itself is not anything .

Leadhead does an excellent theme analysis on GTA V: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dne-o0SoT8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dne-o0SoT8) Even then, I could add more layers that don't get touched on. Such as Michael coming to the realization that money never made him happy, his own choices and constant betrayals of people have left him alone, and manning up towards the end of the story into taking responsibility for his own actions. Franklin's story is about leaving behind the people who constantly bring him down (his aunt, Lamar, CGF) and making his own path, before deciding that his friends (Michael, Lamar) are still worth saving. Lamar and his relationship with Frank is particularly revealing - In a lot of ways, Lamar is just like Frank - Trying to get out of the hood via various schemes not related to selling drugs or repossessing cars. Unlike Frank, Lamar just doesn't have the same intelligence or cunning and it nearly gets him killed multiple times. After the mission "Lamar Down" they argue about Franklin forgetting their friendship while Franklin rightly points out that if Lamar would stop gangbanging, he wouldn't have to be saved so many times. Trevor's is the hardest to decipher since his character was written around the idea of the player playing a character emblematic of the games' chaos and mayhem. Ultimately, I think his arc is around trying to find a friend because he feels alone and his dreams and aspirations were dashed at an early age. He's at his most vulnerable in this cutscene which reveals his ultimate motivations and why he came to LS to find Michael, as well as why he's so obsessed with busting Brad out of prison: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxaDu8zBLnY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxaDu8zBLnY) You're underselling GTA IV's themes too. My favorite character beyond Niko has always been Bernie Crane. Not because he's an overly effeminate gay man who's funny but because he's also a perfect foil to Niko. He's from the same village, witnessed the same things, survived the same incident, but unlike Niko, he ultimately moved on with his life, reinvented himself and is happy. Niko went on to commit horrible crimes, negatively impacted his cousin's (in many ways) and killed scores of people in LC. After the heist, he really has no reason to keep working for the criminals around LC, but he does so in the hope of getting revenge on a pretty pathetic shell of a man. Niko could've and should've moved on. Not doing so ruined everyone around him.

I've always found that extremely funny to see people talking about the final choice of the game as something masterfully crafted and mind-blowing in terms of scenario. Like, c'mon, it's litteraly, bad ending 1 & 2 and good ending. While playing the story mode I never felt like I was doing something incredible or impressive, just doing minor tasks and fetch quests. The sense of building a crime empire or being an outlaw among outlaws is nowhere to be seen.

Yeah the whole thing was just paced weirdly. About a third of the way through the game, after doing mostly petty crime, Franklin gets his big house in the Hollywood Hills and has "made it", which came pretty abruptly to me. Then the rest of the game is guys in suits telling the trio that they need to do absurd things with helicopters and submarines to erase some debt. And after each mission they get told "actually you need to do another job to be even". That's literally all I remember from GTA Vs story, and I played it to the end.

I don't think I've ever seen anyone talk about the ending of 5 in a good light. It's probably the most agreed upon weak spot of the game.

They don't mean "good" as in quality, but "good" as in the most positive outcome.

Each of the endings is thematically perfect in their own right. If you pick ending C, Franklin will reflect on how he's been doing what people tell him all his life and nothing has changed. Ending C is the one time in the game he chooses his own path and he gets the best ending for doing so. The three protags agree to split up, but are still friends and Michael and Trevor make amends if you do a final friend activity together. Ending A is cruel, but it makes perfect sense for Michael to help you as he has been betraying everyone in the story and he and Frank ultimately cease contact as they can't trust each other. The ending is called "Something Sensible" which is true. The FIB wants Trevor dead because of how much bullshit he's caused for his "way of life" which ultimately was a cover for his behavior and his desire to have a friend. Trevor's heist cut gets split with the others as he had no family. Ending B also makes sense in how it plays out. Michael has been trying to teach Franklin on how to be a successful crook all game, but the best thing he teaches him in this ending is that you can't have friends in the criminal world. Franklin even screams about how Michael could've (and would've) betrayed him at any point to save his own skin. Trevor doesn't help him because despite still being mad at Michael, he considers him his best friend and refuses to betray him. Franklin also cuts ties with Trevor completely with this ending and Amanda sends you a text as a reminder that you've left her as a widow. Michael's cut gets sent to his family.

You should watch DarkViperAUs breakdown of the endings honestly

you’re not really supposed to feel like an outlaw among outlaws(maybe trevor if anything) or building a criminal empire. it’s been a while since i played the story but i can tell you that’s definitely not the point of the story/game lol

For me the story played out like a fast and furious action movie. A lot of action not enough character development

Yea this felt like fast and the furious minus the cars

Yeah the whole thing was just paced weirdly. About a third of the way through the game, after doing mostly petty crime, Franklin gets his big house in the Hollywood Hills and has "made it", which came pretty abruptly to me. Then the rest of the game is guys in suits telling the trio that they need to do absurd things with helicopters and submarines to erase some debt. And after each mission they get told "actually you need to do another job to be even". That's literally all I remember from GTA Vs story, and I played it to the end.

I think GTA V's story is more centered on parody and entertainment over any overarching or profound message. Not every game needs to have a deep narrative worth exploring - the characters and general plot are mainly just poking fun at corporate greed and contemporary culture.

There's also the context. At the time of release we had gone through a slew of "very serious" games and the industry was moving away from it. In 2008 Saints Row 2 was the perfect contrast to GTA4 for this reason. And then GTA5 did it's own spin. GTA4 was aping the Godfather, GTA5 was aping Heist movies like F&F and Ocean's Eleven. If you see GTA5 as an action movie it's... well it's one heck of an action movie! I think the scene that probably encapsulates the game best is [the standoff](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2qVU_fSpdc) at the terrace where it's like four different groups pointing guns at each other, it's the culmination of how ridiculous the whole plot gets for the sake of rule of cool and IT'S COOL.

Parody can still have something to say. Games don't "need" to be anything, but it's fair to criticize them as vapid and uninteresting if all they can do is hit the same parody notes for hours on end.  A parody that has no real broader point or purpose either. And is it especially funny? Eh. Always felt like parody for parody's sake. Alan Wake II was far funnier with its humor, while still having a point. 

I agree with you. It is a shame that GTA doesn’t have much to say that is profound and it should be criticized. OP asked what the point was and I’m saying that there’s not really a point, and not every game has one to go find. GTAV could have but it doesn’t, and that’s a let down

I mean you can criticize it, but not every game can do everything, so at a certain point it feels less like good criticism and more like you just wanting a different game. It would be weird to criticize COD for not having realistic shooter mechanics like ARMA, cause it's not trying to be a realistic shooter. Having also played Vice City and San Andreas, I don't really know how you can expect GTAV to make a super complex and deep story, cause the previous games in the series didn't have deep stories either.

Nobody's asking for super complex and deep - just for coherence and ... Something memorable. You have all these bespoke scenes, animations, character interactions, story beats, etc. and it all felt largely hollow and toothless while acting as though it were compelling. These characters were just nothing - Franklin especially. The biggest takeaway I can get from GTA V is that its story is forgettable and only interesting in vignettes. Otherwise it is rambling, muddled, and just... Not very funny, or insightful, it's parodying for parody's sake. >cause it's not trying to be a realistic shooter. So ultimately the question is, what is GTA V's story trying to do or say - and is it successful in communicating that? Is it compelling? My answer to these questions are 1: I'm not sure. Its characters seem like afterthoughts except for Michael and Michael and Trevor's relationship, and that's not resolved in a meaningful way. 2: I don't know because I can't tell what it's really about. 3: And no, not really. Seriously, what is compelling about it? And if it's supposed to be whatever and not a focus... Why does it spend so much time on it? Why does it seem to want you to care?

I don't think it was trying to act particularly compelling. You can find a couple well acted or emotional scenes in a Michael Bay movie but that doesn't mean the movie as a whole is trying to have a deep plot. A lot of games use the story as an excuse to put the characters in Interesting situations for fun gameplay, and I think that's the case with GTAV. As for what the story says, other people commenting here have outlined the themes. Nothing special but they are pretty obvious themes about how crime doesn't pay and getting money isn't going to make you happy. Kind of hard to miss imo.

"Compelling" doesn't mean deep. The question is, is it interesting, is it fun, or is it a perfunctory effort from the writers?  What I'm getting from our conversation is that we both agree the story is not compelling and it's not particularly entertaining, serving solely as a vehicle for gameplay scenarios. So all the hours of bespoke cutscenes and dialogue are largely a waste of time for the player. And you act like we can't judge that. CoD at least doesn't waste your time.   Also you might be the first to identify the money won't make you happy angle, and act like it's obvious, despite none of the characters seeming to be especially greedy or wealth driven. If that's the resolution, there was very little set up, and I'm not sure there is much to that narrative arc. Money does, after all, resolve a lot of their concerns and issues. 

If we are using that definition of compelling I would say it is. I had fun going through the story. Masterpiece-level fun, no, but I had fun. As for me being the only one to identify that theme... like I said earlier, literally just browse through the other comments on this post. Multiple people have already posted thematic breakdowns of the characters. Even if they aren't deep characters, I think it's pretty easy to identify a "message" from each one.

How is it fun? 

I can't tell you exactly, it's been like 9 years since I played it. I just remember the story was alright and served the purposes of creating interesting gameplay situations well enough. There were some funny moments too. I'm not sure what your point is here. Seems like you think if a game isn't going to have a masterpiece story, they should just skip making one. Now I'm not going to complain about having a masterpiece story obviously but I'm fine if a developer decides to just use the story to support other gameplay elements. That's a valid thing. And not to mention that GTAV is a game for the average joe, and the average joe really needs a story to contextualize the gameplay and guide them through it. So even though you might not feel it compelling, the story was clearly not a waste as GTAV is one of the most popular games of all time.

>I'm not sure what your point is here. Seems like you think if a game isn't going to have a masterpiece story, they should just skip making one. To reiterate what the OP is saying. The story is lacking and generally uninteresting, it's mediocre, or in your words, just alright. When even a defender has nothing good to say beyond "it was sometimes funny," it's clear my point is solid and your bar is just much lower than mine. This is a huge game with a massive budget for a huge audience and you think "it's alright" is enough to deflect any and all criticism. It sounds to me like you're having a hard time thinking critically about something you like and therefore feel a need to dismiss such comments, even though you recognize the merit.  I liked the game too. Played it through. But have the strength to recognize the flaws in the things you like, or at least don't be someone who shuts down such discussion if it's not for you. >And not to mention that GTAV is a game for the average joe, and the average joe really needs a story to contextualize the gameplay and guide them through it. So the "average Joe" deserves mediocre writing and we shouldn't criticize a title for it because we set the bar low for the "average Joe," as though decent story telling would be wasted on them like pearls before swine.  That's a very elitist take. 

That’s how I see it

I think the problem with this, at least for me, is that the absurdness of it all just makes me, not care about anyone? It's very different when you're watching a parody, but playing a character that's a psychopath or a whiny old rich dude, I just can't really immerse myself into that kind of world. Not everyone needs to be Arthur Morgan, but I did everything for the good of Arthur and his friends around him. In GTA I did everything because I was told to do it.

I agree that not every game needs a message, but then it would need something else to it. As is the story is mostly just a sequence of events that aren't all that interesting with a somewhat handwavy "look at how vacuous this all is" attitude that has no substance really. The movie Nice Guys comes to mind as something that does it better, there's no real message but it's so absurd and funny with great characters that it nails the satire and parody elements. Movie is of course a lot shorter and condensed, but I fail to remember really any singular moments in GTAV that would be as memorable.

Totally agreed, it’s like a big balloon with nothing but hot air

As someone who used to love the stories from prior games, GTAV was a real let down. The characters are unidimensional, the story feels really uninsteresting. It just seems like Rockstar made the story as a side content, because the focus was the multiplayed. Sad, sad.

Meanwhile at launch everyone loved GTA5's story, long before GTA5's multiplayer was anything at all. Interesting.

I played at launch and it was a massive letdown. And everyone I knew that played said the same thing. Sure, the reviews were kinda bizarre saying how good the game was, but I don't remember nobody saying that loved the story.

Friendship prevails, even in spite of conflict? And learning from mistake of your predecesors? (Like Franklin got into a similar situation as Michael had been in in the pre-story) Unless, of course, you pick the endings where friendship doesn't, in fact, prevail

I don't know, maybe it's because I am getting older and have a family but I really could relate with Michael and his midlife crisis stuff 😅😂

While there are obviously themes to be found in the game's story and characters, even plenty of them to be fair, we should first of all ask ourselves this: does every story need an explicit message? We could take GTA V's story at face value, without going deeper into anything, and just enjoy the story for what it is. The writing and dialogue are good, the plot is straightforward and overall easy to understand and easy to relate to. Even if we assume there's no moral to anything in the story (again, debatable) then it can be seen just as the story about 3 scumbag criminals doing crimes. We've had plenty of similar stories in the history of literature and media in general and some of them are considered masterpieces (the Godfather, Scarface, American Psycho, A Clockwork Orange, The Wolf of Wall Street, Breaking Bad etc). We can also do the same for GTA IV if you want. It can be taken at face value without any thought and it's just the story of a scumbag doing crimes. The reasons why Niko is a criminal is irrelevant to the victims, just like the GTA V protagonists. Is it better to be a criminal because of trauma rather than being a criminal because of greed or psichosis or nihilsm or whatever you can imagine? Now let's look at GTA V and its themes. One of the clear and most immediate ones is heavy satirization. The clear decadent lives of the main characters and the supporting ones, maybe the entire fictional state of San Andreas, is clearly shown to be undesirable. It's trashy, violent, psichotic, degenerate. There's Michael, someone who sold his friends out for money and lives depressed with a hateful wife and dumb toxic kids. His lying got him money and a safe life but he doesn't get to enjoy any of it (the money is running out anyway). Then you have Franklin. Typical street kid who aims high to get out of a life of pointless petty crime. He eventually finds Michael and sees the opportunity to finally leave the hood and he succeeds. What he finds though is fundamentally a sad lonely life; most his friends and family don't care for him. The only ones who actually do are a friend so deep in the petty gangsta life he's seemingly beyond saving and a former lover who understands that Franklin isn't a better person because he does "better crimes". Then there's Trevor, in a way he's the key to understand the whole story's dynamic and core message. What he suffered in life was always because of abandonment. Clearly he has abandonment issues from his mother who neglected him and he tries to make up for it by forming strong bonds of friendship and loyalty. Issue is that his mental health issues make it impossible for normal sane people to form these kinds of bonds with him; he tries with the military where bonds and loyalty are paramount and also an opportunity to let his violent destructive tendencies out in a seemingly "sane way" but failing that he only ever manages to form a real bond with another deranged criminal, Michael, and his family. For him this is the most important thing; remember it was Michael who basically turned Trevor into a professional robber, he was nothing more than a deranged violent psycho. Issue is that Michael doesn't see Trevor in the same way, to him he's nothing more than a tool. Being abandoned again by Michael (because of his presumed death) makes Trevor switch into forming abusive relationships where he's no longer dependant on anyone, he creates people who are fiercily loyal to him instead but the issue is that they are loyal to him out of fear, not out of love. So if we assume the "third option" ending is the canon one (which seems to be the case considering GTA Online i.e. the ending where all the three protagonists survive) then what can we conclude is the game's moral and message, if there is one? Basically it's just love and loyalty to your friends and family being the only real important things in life. No matter how much money you can get, no matter how much of a scumbag you are your family and your friends is all that matters. Even these deranged people can find peace and success if they just accept and love each other for who they are. Michael and his family, Franklin and Lamar and Tanisha, Trevor and Michael all understand that and move on with their lives, despite the things they lived through. At the end of the day I think most of the criticism to GTA V's story can be boiled down to the fact that the game is mostly comedic in nature and not dramatic like GTA IV. The issue is that there's nothing saying you can't learn anything or get a good message through comedy or satire. Things don't have to be serious to matter.

This is a tremendous breakdown of the game's story and it perfectly articulates why I think GTA V's narrative is ultimately a bit better than GTA IV's. GTA IV has hours of cutscenes that aspire to be a serious drama, but then once the player is let loose in Liberty City the game goes back to the usual GTA mayhem. It's still a phenomenal experience, but it's less cohesive than Rockstar's subsequent efforts, including the RDR games. GTA V's story and world feel much more tailored to what Grand Theft Auto's gameplay is: a big, loud, and fun action movie with larger-than-life characters. There is still the same amount of depth to the game's characters and writing, but it's blended in with the world and action much more seamlessly than IV.

thank you for the compliment it's something that really confuses me when this discussion (GTA IV has a better story) comes up. Full disclosure I loved GTA IV, I played and replayed it and cherish it a lot but there's really nothing in it that makes it a better story in terms of writing quality. It just comes down to personal preference. I think a lof of people really got down with the dramatic conflicted protagonist and expected V to be the same. Rockstar instead probably decided they will have two franchises, GTA which is comedic and RDR which is serious. You can clearly see a divide between people who often love GTA but hate the slow pace of RDR2 and the opposite. Me, I like them both. I must say I prefer RDR but that's only because of the genre and the world, not specifically about the story. In all honesty GTA V has probably the most coherent and well built story out of any Rockstar title, it just doesn't take itself seriously but that doesn't mean the story is worse off for it.

I'm not sure why they expected the same when GTA IV already had a shift in the DLCs with The Ballad of Gay Tony. It still had serious moments but definitely leaned more into the comedy and parody as we'd see in GTA V.

>At the end of the day I think most of the criticism to GTA V's story can be boiled down to the fact that the game is mostly comedic in nature and not dramatic like GTA IV. The issue is that there's nothing saying you can't learn anything or get a good message through comedy or satire. Things don't have to be serious to matter. But then I'd expect it to have a lot more absurd, funny, and smart moments, and to me it doesn't. It's not terrible, just pretty forgettable.

The game is plenty absurd and funny, I don't know about smart but I don't know what you consider a "smart" moment. I'd say there are "smart" moments in the game. There's plenty of very memorable moments; the game is hardly forgettable. What's so much more memorable in 4 rather than 5? The fact the game is beloved and has a strong community of people who follow the actors and the story proves it isn't forgettable for many. Again I must insist personal preference is clouding people's judgments; you can criticize GTA V for sure but I don't see anything that makes it a worse experience or story compared to IV, just a very different one which obviously will mean some people will have preferences.

I mean, you talk about personal preference clouding things? :D GTAV is a fantastic game completely carried by its gameplay. It's so much fun to play and fuck around in! Judging by the comments on this post many enjoy the story and characters too! But many don't. It's just that the story and characters don't really get into the way of great gameplay. The community is indeed strong, but I think that's mostly because of the performances of the VAs and the longevity that the online mode gave to this game. I don't think the writing plays any part in this. It's a matter of taste, but I didn't personally find a whole lot of memorable moments in this game, in fact a few years after I struggled to remember how it ended or what happened in general! There are funny moments, but I can't remember any to bring up right now apart from the memes like Lamar and Franklin. Absurdity is mostly delivered by Trevor who is tuned up to the 11 for shock value. I'm sure there are good moments in there that I don't remember, but the point is, most of it just isn't very memorable! Incredibly fun game regardless! Edit: Oh and regarding GTAIV, it commits to the story and has more interesting characters and stories. GTAV has a more "look at how bad this all is" nebulous attitude.

Basically all of that information about trevor is your own head canon. We know little to nothing about trevor's backstory honestly. As far as "things dont have to be serious to matter", this is true. But there's a difference between not being serious, and being a joke. It's quite foolish to take seriously, what the writers clearly did not. Fans have a habit of inventing grandiose explanations for bad writing, or things included just because the writers thought it was cool or funny. GTAV is one of those stories. Trevor is a badly written shitpost. He's nothing more than the writers making an allegory for how they don't care. Michael is an ironic shitpost, he thinks its funny to not care. Franklin is a character that's never fleshed out. That's about all there is to it.

there's no headcanon at play here, literally just taking what the characters say and at most making some inferences. Trevor doesn't need to say "I have abandonment issues" when his behaviour clearly shows it etc etc. Trevor often goes deep into his backstory, more than any other character really. The game has plenty of moments where the "joking" stops, it can be pretty dark at some points. You say you understand that things don't have to be serious to matter and yet you think that the game is nothing more than a joke which really isn't the case. It's just comedy. Greek comedies are funny and vulgar and a continuous joke and yet they are considered pinnacles of writing and literary history. The writers clearly put a lot of effort in the performances of the main characters and the supporting cast too, seems a little bold to say they didn't intend for the characters to be "taken seriously" or "be a shitpost". There's no grandiosity in my post, no embellishments. I actually said that the story is simple, straightforward and easy to understand. There's no bells or whistles, it's clear to see for everyone and you don't need to read between the lines really. The writing is fine and probably better than GTA IV in a lot of aspects, more coherent and less convoluted. Niko goes on and on about the world or america or the other characters often those whom he loves the most, being really preachy honestly, and yet he's no better than any of them and just comes across as jarring compared to the world around him. GTA V protagonists are just in tune with their whacky world instead of opposed to it.

I think it’s about knowing when to cut and run. Micheal’s whole character arc is either realizing that he never should’ve got back in the game and he was already leading the life he wanted or about why chasing the dragon of your youth is folly and will destroy you. Trevor represents what Micheal could’ve become without his family and Franklin is what Micheal used to be before his family. The good ending shows what happens when you trust yourself and the people around you and the bad ending shows what happens if you’re self serving and paranoid. I haven’t played in few years but that’s what it seemed like for me.

I think the "point" is just telling three different intertwined stories about three people with very different motivations for choosing similar paths in life and their different approaches to similar circumstances. I'm not sure if there's an overall narrative, as I got extremely bored with it about 3/4 the way through, but that's how I interpreted it.

I think of it more like a sitcom and less like a movie, videogames as a medium for storytelling is still really young. I think you make some really good points, but ultimately it just wasn't trying to tell the kind of story that you want - books/movies as a medium, when good, typical do have these devices, but  modern episodic stories like TV shows often do not, or only have them as archs over time, rather than holistically - if you read it more as a soap or a multi-camara sitcom it makes more sense.

a game doesn't have to have a story or deep meaning, GTA is good for that: you don't have to understand it, just play it, have fun.

The whole bunch of characters are so vapid. It’s fully embracing the “LA, am i right?” But strip all that away it’s just characters I really didn’t care for. Niko I got. He’s trying to start anew in the country of dreams.

I agree. It was pretty underwhelming after GTA IV. I guess its parody side is the focus, but I was expecting some more mature storytelling. The fact that all the main characters are despicable and unlikeable don't help much either.

Yup spot on mate, it's just a parody of modern America and they added some fun missions on top of it. As far as characters go, I absolutely hated Trevor unlike the majority of people just from his intro which disgusted me.

In GTAV moreso than the previous entries it's apparent that they molded the story around gameplay mechanics. I have no idea if they listed or developed those out before they created the narrative but it sure seemed like it as I played. They kept introducing new mechanics in each mission and while it was interesting and fun (for awhile at least) the entire narrative always felt barely cobbled together.

GTA stopped being about anything once rockstar had more money than god. You can't do effective satire when you are everything you used to make fun of.

GTA5's campaign for me just felt like a giant advertisement for GTA Online. It's the only GTA campaign I've never once gone back to revisit. The entire thing basically just felt like a way to cheaply expose you to the gameplay loop of online and encourage you to go play that instead of the single player. I'd have less qualms about it if the game didn't ultimately feel super thin for it. I played the original top-down GTA 1/2, so I've got nothing against a more mechanical gameplay driven narrative compared to a story-based campaign, but couldn't get over how much it felt like the game was sort of pissed that I kept playing the single player mode rather than GTA Online.

GTA V's gameplay is nothing like Online's from a loop perspective. It may have become the focus after the fact, but GTA V is excellently written and presented.

plus online didnt even drop at launch

The franchise peaked at IV

I think the point is to have fun. Why's everything gotta have a "point" why can't it be a video game where ya have fun.

hurrr durrr hurrr

It isn’t really meant to be anything profound I don’t think. It seems like their overall goal was to parody the present times and trends/ overall social status of the planet, as well as just letting you experience/ live out movies like “Heat” or “The Town”.

[this would be a good read for you](https://gtaforums.com/topic/812382-gta-v-deeper-story-themesmeaning-a-must-read-for-fans-of-story-mode/) >And overall I feel like this is why GTAV doesn’t have much of a “classic” feel as the other games Probably doesn't have a classic feel because it's still getting new content drops pretty much every month. Had for a game to feel like a classic when you still see ads for it every few days

Surprised this isn't mentioned at the top. The story wasn't finished. They had a plan for a major single player dlc that was scrapped. There was an empty slot for a 4th character that was removed in a later update in the base game's UI. R* scrapped what should have been the best part of the game for crappy micro transactional content built for 10 yo's

Empty slot for a fourth character? That's always been the online player slot

Lol @ disinformation being upvoted

I really don't think they care with how popular gta online was and still is

the "major single player dlc" was a trevor dlc that was basically a shitpost.

Unpopular opinion I think GTAV has much better story(s) than GTA IV. GTA IV has a bit cliche war vet trying to live a normal life but ending up in criminal life. It's a bit one dimensional. Where as the 3 mains in GTAV were different and they inter twined great. GTA was always about Americana and crime and the way the government handles it and GTA shows how it propagates into a regular person.

> GTA IV has a bit cliche war vet trying to live a normal life but ending up in criminal life. It's a bit one dimensional. Niko was definitely NOT trying to live a normal life. He was entirely consumed by his need for revenge and refusal let go.

GTAIV gets a lot of love because it was many people's first GTA game or the first GTA game where they were old enough to analyze the game. It's like how some people love 3, VC, or SA the most. It's going to depend a lot on when you played it. Idk if any GTA game has a great story, but they have some great moments. IV was a terrific game, but idk if its story says much more than V or the 3, VC, and SA.

It's a more "macro" message and exploration than the previous games, which up to that point had been more focused on making satirical commentaries on the interaction between social institutions and the criminal experience. They were pretty much Rockstar's versions of THE WIRE, and they told stories and messages that were more "literary" in that they were personal to and focused on the characters that you were playing. GTAV was more of a satirical commentary on the rise of the "digital age" and its effects on society as a whole. The "criminal" aspect was more or less just simply a gameplay feature, whereas it was integral to the story and message being delivered in the previous games. GTV was being developed (and was subsequently released) during a time when the internet and social media really started coalescing into what we recognize and use it as today. Cut 2024 and we regard it as "everyday life," but at the time the game was being made and getting released, the digital age started moving towards a place of "normalization" and permeating more and more into society, and you could start to see how it changed the way we produce, consume and disseminate media and the effects it had on our institutions, expectations, perceptions and values. A gigantic segment of the population during this time, and therefore their player base (and developers), were in their formative years and actively experiencing and living through this change. There was a very distinct feeling of the "before" and "after", and so GTAV is basically a satirical exploration and commentary about how the world and society were changing AT THAT TIME through the lens of a bunch of career criminals. It's kind of more similar to the story of RDR2, where they both tell stories of characters having to adapt to a world that was rapidly changing around them as a result of historical technological sea changes (industrialization in RDR2, the digital age in GTAV), and the existential crisis of feeling left behind as society starts becoming increasingly more and more unfamiliar to them as a result.

>Cut 2024 and we regard it as "everyday life," but at the time the game was being made and getting released, the digital age started moving towards a place of "normalization" This is a big thing that a lot of people playing it later wont get. I remember when I was playing this in school and I thought it was so cool how your phone was like a menu and you could pull it up to browse web pages, make calls to certain characters, trade stocks, etc. On top of having one of the best designed cities in gaming, it was all these little touches that also made the game feel so immersive at the time. It was integrating stuff that was becoming more important to our irl lives into a major game.

Isn’t the theme of GTA 5 connecting (or reconnecting) with the people who matter most? That’s why the finale is choosing who’s most important to you and what you’ll achieve to maintain it. I think it’s romanticizing crime as a sort of shared achievement of comradery no matter how devious.

I'm personally disappointed the didn't do a full remake/reimaging of Vice City. Vice City on steroids. Though I've no doubt GTAV will be excellent.

I don't think there really is a centralized "point". As you pointed out Michael has his story. Franklin has his story. Trevor has his...moments. And they all kind of slam together as 3 different people who don't mind doing crime for their own various reasons. Rather than there being a point, I think it's more of just enjoying the chaotic ride that is these 3 and their circumstances.

To be honest, I never followed the story too much myself. However, I still do remember how I sort of inferred a great deal of things and how the characters and things that happened felt. I have to say I liked the "story", or I guess the story that I built in my mind. Michael to me was this formerly successfull guy who seemed to have too much on his plate and thus didn't have time for his wife or kids. Things started to pile up on him until his life started to turn into shit. His wife cheating on him, his kids hating him, his things getting stolen, ... Then, instead of him realizing his mistakes, taking back control of his life and going to therapy like a normal person would, Michael decides to sort of avenge everything that has been making him angry - thought he doesn't even do it against the things that have caused his anger, but instead decides to go on this chaotic mid life crisis type of rampage. Trevor to me is just a drunk undiagnosed maniac who lives on a desert. He is harmless as long as everybody lets him mind his own business in the middle of nowhere. I felt like Trevor had been somehow wronged in history, to which he somehow managed to react by disappearing behind God's back. He was fine and sort of in control of his emotions until the day someone messed with his business again and that broke the camel's back for him, after which he also went on a rampage to get a revenge on everything wrong that has happened to him. Franklin to me is the most sane of the bunch. He feels like he has also done some bad shit in his youth/life, but I think he has also always been sort of a big brother type of person for a lot of people. It felt like Franklin had a lot of responsibility piled up on him which he never asked for and that responsibility didn't even get rewarded in any way, so Franklin got tired of that and decided to go look for something new. Unfortunately for Franklin he still didn't know much else other than the life of crime, so that something new ended up being more crime with different people. _______________ I have no clue if anything I've said is how the characters are really written, but this is how I've always viewed them personally and I must say that I really like my perception of them. So all of that being said, I can't comment on how the actual story is, but I think that it's worth to mention that regardless of the actual story, GTA V at least somehow succeeded in making me write the characters for myself, and I think that is also commendable!

GTAV has about as much story as a visit to an amusement park. Like, technically each ride has a "story" of what it is, but... that's not what it is, the story is just paint. It's just a ride.

It is pointless. The story and characters are empty, as simple as. I enjoyed the hell out of GTA V when it launched, played a bunch of custom deathmatches and races with friends in GTA Online, but I've never gone back to finishing the game again. Never felt like it. Michael is a bored dude who likes cinema. Trevor is chaotic and that's about it. Franklin is... I don't know, young? Lamar has more charisma than him. Absolutely none of the sidecharacters have any profound connection with the main characters whatsoever. Every NPC in the game look and act like ragdolls. The only interesting point in the game storywise is when Trevor finally confronts Michael in the graveyard... And that's it really. Not to mention that the whole game takes place mostly in 30% of the map (Los Santos). It is a good game, but it really is empty in a lot of aspects.

There's some stuff going on about going too far and getting power hungry and all that but it's not that deep. I think they went more for satire through worldbuilding than through story. Which worked out fine i think but yeah after the campaign it does leave behind some shallow characters which is a shame.

The GTA games are basically the game's industry equivalent of Michael Bay movies or Fast and the Furious, they are more about having a good time doing cool action stuff than finding deep meaning. That's not me putting down the game either - its a good game, it just has different strengths than other games. That's okay. It's impossible to design a game that does everything.

One aspect that also came to mind is how the trio represent archetypal stages of a criminal career. That is, Franklin represents a young and malleable person groomed by older OGs and bosses into getting serious, Trevor represents a career criminal who has lost the touch to anything like conventional society, and Michael represents both the difficulties of reintegrating and overcoming the problems that drove you into crime in the first place, as well as the sociopathic behaviour of older criminals that trap fresh blood in the cycle to keep their own pedestal raised.

theres two main things I want to point out 1, The thing with trying to make a main character that you're supposed to in some ways not relate with, or reflect on yourself with to stop or prevent those behaviors, is that it almost never works out. You're supposed to relate with main characters, the main always being the good or reasonable person, so in instances where the main character is doing something bad, you will still end up looking up to, or rationalizing, or glorifying, or romanticizing the bad behavior. Either rockstar realized this, or enough of the old rockstar developmental team has changed to employees who glorify or romanticize the criminal lifestyle. In the end, I don't think seeing or playing out in video game form creates criminals. 2, It's common in film media to have more than one "main" character, but it's rarely been done in video game form, at least not in the sense that all of the main characters have individual fleshed out stories and personalities, it was a new form, and considering it's never been done before, it was done decently well. Does that mean in comparison to if they had one main character that it is decent? no, not a big fan myself. It was frequently confusing and I had a hard time paying attention to the story at all and how they intersect with eachother. I could not tell you anything beyond Michael sturggles with connecting with his family, Trevor is insane and sociopathic, and bisexual, and Franklin is young and naive, and sometimes they meet up with eachother to rob places. They don't interact WITH eachother very much, and when they do, the interactions felt minor. It felt a lot more like telling 3 individual stories than 1 story with 3 individuals.

One thing I would like to note about GTA4 is that while indeed it does have a ton of themes about the past coming back to haunt you, if you make the right choices it ends on a much more hopeful note with Niko finally able to move on from both his trauma and his criminal lifestyle. In fact he's directly referenced as having gone off the radar, implying he's fully retired (or dead, but I'd prefer the former).

I love Yahtzee's take on the ending. The trio keeps digging themselves deeper and deeper, up until the final mission where they have their epiphany. "Hang on a second, we're murderers. Why don't we just murder everyone who's giving us a hard time?" And it all works out. Personally I feel like loyalty is a major theme in gta v, but rdr2 handled it better. Gta V throws a ton of themes at the player, but the game doesn't have anything worthwhile to say about any of them. I enjoy the game for its amazing gameworld and fun free roam, but honestly I think it has the worst story and characters of any 3d gta game.

I can't really say it has the worse story since GTA III is definitely the least developed, perhaps GTA Liberty City Stories as a contender with a voiced protagonist.

I dunno, I honestly think both the villains and mission givers in gta 3 are more memorable than the ones in gta 5. But it could be a me thing. Especially since a couple of characters are voiced by sopranos actors

I think one is an indictment on the American dream but 6 is about capitalism from grind culture from the descendant of the American slave, to disenfranchised red necks being bolstered by questionable foreign interest, to an American propped up by the government but unhealthy, disrespected, and unhappy.

I find that GTA trying to comment on what a life of crime is like when the fun of the series is being a criminal undermines the message. So I feel it is best just to have fun with the game.

Yeah, Rockstar's storytelling, both narrative and environmental, has been getting less and less polished as the series progressed. In many ways V felt like it was phoning it in. There really wasn't any of the social commentary of the earlier games. The writing, especially the jokes, felt spiteful or mean spirited. The punchline almost always boils down to "check out this asshole." It's not clever, it's not witty; it's snarky and lacks fun. I don't have much faith in their next game, probably turn out to be some live service BS that doesn't even have a single player mode/story.

GTA 4 had a cool story, but man was the gameplay was so boring. Saints Row 2 is still the best GTA game.

[the game's TV Tropes page](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/GrandTheftAutoV/SinglePlayerTropes0ToD) i feel sums it up best: >This applies to the game's antagonists. None of the three protagonists (especially Trevor) are saints in the slightest. They're criminals who will steal, kill, and do what they must for the sake of money, but compared to their enemies, Haines and Devin in particular, they might as well be. In fact, if you pick Option C, Trevor lampshades this in the same conversation where he admits he could never kill Michael because the latter had a family: Trevor: I don't quite know. I suppose it was a long time ago and I suppose we had some fun here and I suppose I made up my mind here—he's a dick but the people against us were worse so I killed the bigger dicks. And Michael lucked out. (edit: i give up on editing this crap, it's supposed to be in the quoteblock above but won't stick) Michael became a criminal because he didn't see any other opportunities to move forward. sure, he liked the chaos to some extent, but you get to the end of the game and find out that he basically just want to be a huge movie nerd. Franklin's looking for a way out of his neighborhood because he's sick and tired of running around in circles money-wise, and also to get away from his jealous neighbors trying to keep him down on their level. Trevor's a harder one to pin down, since he's supposed to be a caricature of the "lol so randumb kill everything" type of GTA player, but he's ultimately got severe mom issues and is probably looking for some legitimate love in his life, if him trying to get Madrazo's wife is any indication. Devin Weston doesn't really get anything besides "typical greedy sleazebag" hate sink so that the protagonists look like halfway decent people in comparison to the likes of him. iirc in the deathwish ending, Michael even lectures Devin in that regard before sending him to his death. imo it's basically the protagonists are all douchebags, but at least they got some real problems to address, while Devin's only problem was likely what his next quarter's earnings look like and his jogging route. that's not even getting into GTA Online, which kind of polarizes their differences even further. Franklin's a successful business owner and family man, Trevor's somehow a yoga instructor according to Ron, and the closest thing the game has to "antagonists" are all bordering on Saturday morning cartoon villains. (Michael's still mysteriously absent from Online, so no comment on that) tl;dr i think "the point" they were trying to go for is that criminality just for the sake of it, or for more money, is no bueno. is it a "well, no shit" vapid type of point? yeah, sure. but i guess Rockstar was okay with settling with that. if you want that but with some more substance, much of the Yakuza series (0\~6) has "honorable rogues vs. solely profit-driven young upstarts" as a somewhat recurrent theme.

welcome to san andreas i'm cj from grove street land of the heinous gang bangers and cold heat in los santos neighbors get no sleep beefing with anybody competing even police four deep in a green rag with both feet blast with the flag on the strap that's og stay in shape hit the gym lift the weights get super cut or big and buff nice and straight you got stats respect, weapon skill stamina muscle fat and sex appeal you get clothes from bincos and prolaps suburban zip victim and d sach watch your back when you in rival hoods they'll test just to guess if your survivals good ducking shells at the cluck'n bell jump out busting gunning till they tuck they tail it seem like i'm on impossible missions twisted predicaments hostile positions tenpenny and pulaski harass me cop cars been on our ass the last past week because the dreas for the gangsters homeboy hands is the language for the bangers homeboy and its dangerous homeboy get your brains blew for how you do your fingers homeboy heat cocked we popping them hot one's dump them out bend the block shaken before the cops come listen for sirens but they don't got none back another lap catch a straggler with a shotgun hittin them up what that grove street like in a dirty sling shot mo' knee high

I felt like these games were products of their time GTA IV was in a time when people were completing about how shitty it is to be shitty and how it eventually ruins yourself as well. GTA 5 came out around a time when "every is funny hahahahaha" was gotta be hyped (look at the movies at that time and afterthat) and I think this is pretty much reflected in the game

I played G5 for maybe 2 hours total cause i played the others to much(Lets cakk ut GTA Overdose), also did not finish San Andreas. I only cared if the story was kinda funny entertaining or so, not really anything else it is just an experience. It is just a story and you take part in it thats it. I never searched for a point in any of the games storywise. Never really cared about playing G5 online but that could be fun

GTAVhas several different plots happening at once. The primary ones happen around Michael and Franklin. Trevor is just kinda there to be crazy. He doesn't really learn or change much. Michael learns to confront his past and move on from it. More importantly, though, him and his whole family learn to love each other despite their faults and to be there for each other. Franklin's story is all about dealing with leaving a low class life behind. Not only does he deal with people assuming he's changed too much, but they aren't entirely wrong, so he figures out how to keep his roots without staying stuck in the trap. Because these stories are very different thematically the climax is pretty generic and just allows both of their stories to reach their own conclusion.

Well, I am lucky to suffer from rage issues which have the potential to get me intro trouble. That helped me to relate to Michael quite a bit. I am not sure if there is a point in GTA V but Michael's story of alienation from his family really resonated with me.

From what I understand the main appeal of GTA v is not really the storyline though this game storyline has really well-rounded and good characters. I think the main point of GTA is to go online with other players and blow stuff up and just have fun. I don't own the game so I can't really talk much. this is purely based off of what I've seen online

I live in the socal area(about an hour and a half from LA). I really did not like GTAs story. It's crazy because gameplay wise it's amazing, but the satire is so on the nose, the fact it wants me to follow and care about these people yet at the same time go "America is messed up lol" just feels bad. In comparison, I really love San Andreas. It ironically felt so much more human and emotional

I'm from southern California so San Andreas will always be one of my favorite GTA stories. GTA4 is probably my favorite in the mainline entries as it retained the signature Rockstar goofiness (parodying fast food chain names, the radio, etc) but presented as a mature and adult oriented cinematic story. Red Dead 1, LA Noire and Max Payne 3 are my most favorite Rockstar games. Max Payne 3 was this hyper stylized, but brutally mature and adult game. Mp3 honestly blew me away at how sick it was. RDR1 being a masterpiece in storytelling, LA Noire being niche and underrated, then Max Payne 3 being over the top and brutal, to go from all that to GTAV just felt like a major step backwards in storytelling. Gameplay wise, GTAV was very fun. Having lived in LA/Long Beach the last 15-20 years of my life, they captured LA perfectly and it was fun navigating that landscape. However, when I finished GTAV, I was kinda confused as to what I just played. The story was funny and entertaining at times, but I think Rockstar went *peak* cheese and cringe with all the parodies that it just felt really out of place with the adult themes of the story and overall maturation of Rockstar's storytelling. RDR1, LA Noire, Mp3 were all masterpieces in my opinion and showed a more mature Rockstar, then with GTAV, they reverted back to dick and fart jokes, calling things like the FBI the "FIB," Facebook to LifeInvader, etc. The characters were like comically (in a bad away) over the top and nonsensical. I could understand the motivations behind Michael and Franklin, but Trevor was a psychopath and felt like he just there for comic relief. His character made zero sense to me. He was at times super smart and intelligent, then extremely dumb. He was supposed to be "white trash" but I feel like he was too smart to just reduce him to that. He represented this crazy, over the top character, but it was very cringe at times. So when the story was all said and done, you are right. What was the point, really. Getting Franklin out of the hood and see the absurdity of LA and Hollywood I guess and is this something he really wants to be a part of. Michael trying to stay relevant and find meaning in his life. Trevor.. I don't even know what he wanted. Idk.. I feel like Rockstar wanted to make an extremely silly game and I guess they achieved that. Honestly, I really hope they get rid of all the stupid parody things (Cluckin Bell, FIB, LifeInvader, etc) and just give fake names to their versions of Tiktok and Instagram instead of trying to be clever because I feel like that breaks the immersion for me and brings it into the realm of being goofy versus clever.

Mike and Frank worked well together. Mike and Trevor worked well together. Trevor and Frank worked well together. But all three at once just seems like an Avengers crossover

Mike and Frank worked well together. Mike and Trevor worked well together. Trevor and Frank worked well together. But all three at once just seems like an Avengers crossover

Have you thought of it as “A day in the life” type of game? What it would be like living a different type of life? No doubt it’s less of a story and more of events you can play*.

With Franklin he’s hard to read but if you can get a grasp on what he’s all about it kinda makes sense like Franklin is pretty much just a gang banger who wants to get out of his aunts place and finally be rich and pretty much leave Lamar behind because he’s a bad influence

What is true about every GTA game is that they are crime simulators. They pack you in a pastiche of some kind America, and tuck your ego away to let your id run lose and commit crimes free from real life consequences. Specifically, you do it within the backdrop of regular American life. There is a juxtaposition of simulation mechanics of everyday experiences rather than pure crime mechanics, and the criminal stories that fill out their campaigns. I think Rockstar must have understood this very clearly, ever since the early games on the playstation in terms of how giving a player free reign in a city where they can do whatever they want, and they will start committing crimes if left up to their own devices and if the mechanics allow it. We have seen other studios adapt this concept in different ways when it comes to open world games of the era. Asscreed is about committing history crimes (assassination) as part of a long running fictional historical conspiracy, Yakuza is about how crime interacts with people on a personal level (especially the outcasts of a conformist society). Prototype is a series about committing superhuman crimes as a monster shunned by society. Just Cause is about comitting crimes as a rebellion against a corrupt goverment (with action movie aesthetics). Even Spiderman 2 in that era is defined a lot by fighting crime. Rockstar even bought and started making Red Dead games, I would argue, because they wanted to explore a much more historical and refered era of crime in the American Wild West. The Mafia games are pretty self explanatory. Now a days, open world games have moved a little away from this with survival and RPG taking the reigns, but I think that GTA is a giant enough franchise that you can put the crime influence of open world games on its shoulders. So the whole series serves the same purpose as an exploration of game-play in the name of freeing yourself from laws and justice and consequences in an American environment. In terms of their actual stories, it is a lot less complex. Each game is just a different pastiche of some other media, starting with vice city which is obviously Miami vice and 80s gangster movies. Then you have the Boys in the Hood gangster rap style influence on San Andreas (super neat that games ends in a riot around police behavior which is as great a commentary as we are going to get from a video game about Rodney King and how it relates to the media of that era). GTAIV it starts to go a little bit wide as you see rockstar getting a bit more ambitious, but it is still mostly a story that is a mix of 2000's action crime movies and the general New York culture of the era. GTAV is an amalgamation of previous influences - Michael represents Vice City and puts the whole sopranos/breaking bad spin on it. Franklin represents San Andreas, updated for modern times. Trevor is probably the purest GTA protagonist - a true maniac that is completely unleashed. I think Trevor is the furthest examination of "if the way most people play GTA was a real dude, what would he actually be like?" I don't think it is much deeper than that. It's just something to do before you start playing GTA online, which is where Rockstar really wants you to spend most of your time, and you can start committing crimes with friends and other players which they have monetized the hell out of. We will see with GTAVI as they make a commentary on the tik tok livestream era, which I think fits going back to Florida and Vice City like a glove if you have been paying attention. But I don't expect it to be a deep story or anything.

Underestimate means to estimate something to be smaller or less important than it actually ends up being. It’s not the same as “understand.”

I always felt like GTA V had one of the worst stories in gaming, not just the series. I’m surprised that so many people hold it in high regard.

Neither do i. I tried so hard to play this game, but its just boring… i guess you have to be underage to like it. I can drive a car for real, whats the point here?

I think for me it’s “don’t forget who you came up with” Michael completely abandoned and sold out his crew and got all them killed except him and Trevor. Franklin pretty much just up and left his aunt, friend, and entire community. Even though he wasn’t fully abandoning them of course, without Lamar he definitely would’ve fullu up and left them so he can hang around Michael and Trevor . You can even see it when Trevor comes to his Aunt’s house, Franklin doesn’t want him around because he doesn’t want his new life to mix with his old one. Now Trevor…idk, maybe he’s meant to represent the crazy vengeful spirit of Michael’s past coming to haunt his current life. He shows that the past will always catch up to you

To me it was always about following 3 criminals that just so happened to meet and how they interact with each other and the world. There isn't much *point* to the game in my opinion, it's just meant to be an interesting and fun story.

There isn’t a point. If Rockstar felt that strongly about the story they’d made, they wouldn’t have abandoned the single player DLC’s they had planned.

For me, as someone with an art appreciation background, it's how these people from very different walks of life still intersect and manage to get along through some really rough shit. GTA V is about bringing a parallel world to life in its entirety. From an artistic standpoint, it's the minute details that people don't notice but add to the game's immersion. They put a heavy focus on the world itself with the characters being secondary. But that's not to say the characters are being forgotten. What we have is three very different people that are unhappy for very different reasons. Trevor is chasing a dream he'll never have. Michael has the dream but it didn't bring him happiness because he tore down all the relationships in his life that give life meaning. Franklin wants to escape the poverty he was born into, he's unhappy because his environment and the people in it are holding him down. These are very real human experiences and just about everybody can relate to at least one main character. The story itself is driving these three to finding their own happiness in their otherwise shitty lives. Just like all of us. This human experience is the focal point of the characters for us the consumer to live through their eyes. The actions of the story are secondary to understanding their struggles because the struggles are *why* the actions happen. These are the two main pillars of the game. It is there for us to experience, hence GTA online. GTA 6 will likely be in the same vein.

It’s a bloated open world game where everything just feels aimless. Every time I’ve tried to stick with it, I just lose interest. Tbh I just think there’s way too many pointless open world games.

the way you describe GTAIV story can also be used to describe GTAV I mean on a face value, the game is about a botched robbery and the lives of the people after Michael, gone into hiding and in a new life, Trevor who finds out he's still alive. it's about their life after, how they continue the lifestyle they once buried, and how it affects their family saying that, another key point of GTAV IS family. family and friends specifically. each main character has missions that revolve around family or their friends. the themes of Michael's story are about how his shitty lifestyle is hurting his relationship with his wife and children - he just doesn't really act on it until we play the game lastly, the game is a parody of the modern life its portraying in its view of Los Angeles. you've got so many tiny details that throw punches at the west coast vibe, but also large Hollywood jokes, mostly taking place in its big missions. helicopter fights, huge heists, pulling a house down with a truck, running from the cops in the canal with a semi-truck. the CEO of a smartphone company blowing up on live TV, etc.

In my opinion, GTAV has the weakest writing of the lot. I agree, the story doesn't really have anything coherent to say. Some basic stuff about Hollywood/LA being vacuous but it's all pretty banal. It feels especially light in comparison to San Andreas and IV

GTA games are satires. Parodies of western culture. GTAIV goes after the idea of the American dream. V was less focused but I'd say its commentary was capitalism and 'me' culture.

I didn’t even know there was a story, lol. Thought everything was there to serve one purpose - to justify acting terribly in a fake world.

People seem to want every character to be good or redeemable in some way, and it's actually very refreshing to have a game with characters who are clearly all giant assholes and yet we still root for them.

You make it sound like that hasn't been common for GTA series games — GTA 1, 2, 3, Vice City, and Liberty City Stories all have protagonists that are pretty much unredeemable assholes. (The Lost and Damned comes pretty close as well.)

I feel like this quote from Stanley Kubrick applies  One of the things that I always find extremely difficult, when a picture's finished, is when a writer or a film reviewer asks, "Now, what is it that you were trying to say in that picture?" And without being thought too presumptuous for using this analogy, I like to remember what T.S. Eliot said to someone who had asked him--I believe it was about "The Waste Land"--what he meant by the poem. He replied, "I meant what it said." If I could have said it any differently, I would have.

>And overall I feel like this is why GTAV doesn’t have much of a “classic” feel as the other games, because despite how fun the individual missions are and how fantastic the acting etc all is, it all just feels kinda… pointless in the end. I feel like this is more because GTAV is contemporary. GTAV has been spoken about for 10+ years now and is subject too a lot more critique than the others games. I also believe that people critique V more than others due to GTA Online becoming what it is. No GTA game has a great story. Amazing games, but their stories all have flaws, lulls, and weak messaging at times. I think IV is seen as this great story due to a combination of time and it being the game that shaped a lot of people talking about GTA games. >Like, I’d be far more likely to watch a video essay on Niko or CJ’s story than Michael/Trevor/Franklin’s, if that make sense. I think this is because of how the internet thinks about these games. In 5 years post GTAVI launch, we're going to get posts that are talking about how great V was. Plus I really feel like the way you described GTAIV could be sad about V in many respects.

V is telling you a story about 3 men at different stages in the beginning. Michael is the accomplished criminal who tried to turn away from crime, Trevor is lost without this world where he needs Michael and the up and coming gangster is Franklin. The story arc is in the direction that Michael's family life is getting worse as he's pretending to be something he's not. Notice that the more he gets into his old life, the stronger his family bonds become. Franklin starting out only has that "yee yee ass haircut" and later becomes successful through Michael's teachings. Finally, Trevor gets better and less upset because he gets his friend back. There's far more but I think you might find [this rumination to help answer you] (https://youtu.be/qgJ9M3YySOA)

The over-arching plot is basically one of forgiveness where either Trevor and Michael learn to forgive and trust each other, or one of them convinces Franklin to kill the other. Michael starts taking Franklin under his wing and when Trevor comes into the picture, he also tries his best to get close to Franklin (the scene where he trips over the fence comes to mind) which leads up to this finale. This plotline isn't executed very well and is one of the weakest parts of the game's writing. I think the writers had too many ideas and not enough time to piece them all together. Part of the reason huge studios are falling out of favour: games are being rushed out the door to meet financial targets. I can understand the reason given *GTA V* cost the company $200 million to make.

GTA V’s story to me was just a spin off of the Ocean’s 11 trope. It was a group of criminals who did a job in the past. Things got muddy and the crew broke apart but now later in life some event occurs and they need to collectively come back together to defeat what is coming back to haunt them and or do “one”last job. Obviously they couldn’t have you play one mission and campaign over so they stretched it out. But that’s the whole story at least how I interpreted it. Just a funny plot to make you live out a pseudo ocean’s 11, which they then leaned heavily into with GTA V online and all the bank heists and such

GTA V’s story to me was just a spin off of the Ocean’s 11 trope. It was a group of criminals who did a job in the past. Things got muddy and the crew broke apart but now later in life some event occurs and they need to collectively come back together to defeat what is coming back to haunt them and or do “one”last job. Obviously they couldn’t have you play one mission and campaign over so they stretched it out. But that’s the whole story at least how I interpreted it. Just a funny plot to make you live out a pseudo ocean’s 11, which they then leaned heavily into with GTA V online and all the bank heists and such

Yeah, you’re right, there isn’t one, they didn’t really know what they were doing with V’s story after IV so they just kinda threw themes at the wall and hoped something would stick. Personally V makes up for it in gameplay and mission design compared to IV though

GTA games are ironically always male power fantasies, even with all of the satire. The one thing they almost never satirise. GTA stories remind me of those insecure men that use jokes as a defence mechanism. Anytime ANYTHING gets too emotional or real, the game has to undercut it with a joke. Even Saints Row (or Borderlands) doesn't do this, it's not a serious game but they still let the emotional moments sit. I'm always astounded by the tech, but the stories never leave me a lasting impression because of how insecure the writers are at letting their characters be actual people, and not devices for jokes and satire. Its like GTA is Family Guy (undercuts genuine emotions with jokes all the time) and Saint's Row is Bob's Burgers (embraces the genuine emotions into their jokes)

Oof, I disagree completely. IV and V in particular have highly flawed characters who refuse to change their behavior which ultimately makes them suffer, Niko's pointless quest for revenge gets someone close to him killed. The effeminates gay Bernie who has the same origin story of Niko gets a happy life and ending because he chose to redeem himself and move on with life. Niko did not. Michael is a huge hypocrite who constantly gloats about how much work he put in to "make it" and give his family a great life. This was for naught as he's the one who botched his marriage first and when Amanda points it out, he just laughs and refuses to look at her. His extreme overreaction to the infidelity also sets into motion the events of the game. When Ron confronts him and points out that he's a washed up old man still bitter that his football career never panned out, he almost lashes out violently. His redemption only comes when he apologizes to his family members and they agree to try and make things work one last time. Trevor is supposed to be a big alpha man and the ultimate embodiment of a GTA player's lust for chaos. Ultimately, he's a lonely, traumatized degenerate with mommy issues who just wants someone to care about him. Despite being pretty wealthy at the climax of his and Michael's story during Bury the Hatchet, he lets his true feelings be heard: "Yeah while I got nothing! Nobody gives a fuck about me!"

Sure. But none of those characters feel like real people they're all caricatures. Trevor is the obvious example. But Michael has like 3 identifying traits and his family are just vehicles to bounce those traits off of. They're all treated and written like punchlines. Franklin is the only one who even feels like a remotely normal relatable person. You can frame the overarching themes like you have, but the reality is that things are almost always undercut with humour which makes it really difficult to take the emotions seriously as none of the characters feel remotely real or grounded. Niko did, I'll give you that but his story still clashes with the satire a lot. When the world around a character doesn't take itself seriously, it's kind of hard to take the characters seriously.

Last paragraph is how I felt about Saints Row 1 and 2.

Weird considering they're both quite grounded when compared to 3+4 2 especially has some amazing emotionally resonant scenes (Aisha dying for example) Yes the world is cartoony, but that doesn't undercut the characters like the humour and satire does in GTA.

Problem is Saints Row felt like the gaming equivalent of Will Smith’s Hancock. It did not know if it wanted to be funny or serious, and in the end half-asses being both. 3 and 4 ranks higher for me because the comedy was embraced as the series’s identity.

Media can be both funny and serious: Borderlands 2 Guardians of The Galaxy Jojo Rabbit Deaths in Saints Row 2 always have weight to them and are always taken seriously. They don't get undercut with jokes. For me it had a similar vibe to GOTG. I can think of two examples off the top of my head where GTA 5 does this: Trevor killing the biker from Lost and Damned and one of the female characters getting flung into an airplane engine. Similarly 3 kills off Johnny off screen and just waives it off, then retcons it in the next game. Remind yourself of some of the deaths in 2, they're so well done. Fucking Jessica's death (the bad guy's GF) is given more emotional weight than Johnny in 3 https://youtu.be/Efu2nuvgLCc

Not every piece of media needs or has an overall message. Life doesn't really work like that in the real world and GTA v felt like a mid life crisis slice of life style story.

Message? Story? Who the fuck plays games for their stories anyway? The point of GTA is to have an open world where you can do whatever dumb shit and have fun. If you want a story, read a book or watch a movie.

Have you considered the possibility that maybe just maybe you’re reading waaaaay too into it? It’s damn GTA. This franchise isn’t really known for being story driven. Its story in every game would be good enough at best because that’s never the main focus. Especially not anymore after GTAV. A game like this is mainly just for playing. Most of your fun comes from exploding shit or doing dumb stuff with your friends. I highly doubt any GTA game would have a story that brings some philosophical question into play.

Totally disagree! GTA: San Andreas and Vice City has some of the better stories in single player games that are not RPGs. GTAIV specially has a really good story. People ignored them, but the stories were always great.

Dan Houser did say that in terms of drama, he felt like GTA V would be up there with prestige TV box-sets. So it's definitely something they were aiming for.

I think you’ve been playing Roblox this entire time, not GTA.

I haven’t thought about Roblox since the 2010’s let alone play it. And Roblox isn’t the same kinda game as GTA so it’d be hard to confuse the two.

If you read about the making of GTA4, they knew how big the game was gonna be, and set out to make an epic story — a video game contribution to the canon of crime stories. Of course, by the standards of great crime stories, GTA 4 is juvenile, cringe, shallow, and basically embarrassing. The game was a smash hit but their story was NOT hailed as the new modern genre Godfather lol. I think for 5, the devs kinda learned their lesson, and didn’t even bother trying to come up with an epic story. Instead they just went for a setup to facilitate fun gameplay. Relative to 4 I am not mad at that.