Review: Grand Theft Auto V PC

Another benefit to the multi-protagonist setup and also one of the biggest new features to mission portion of the game are heists. While the majority of missions are either driven by a single character or are like the aforementioned one, there’s a handful of heists sprinkled throughout. Heists are basically multi-tiered missions that contain multiple small missions to set them up and require a higher level of planning to correctly execute. The first heist in the game, for instance, concerns knocking off a high-end jewelry store. There are two methods available to tackle the job: quiet or loud (smart or dumb). Going in loud is what you’d imagine, simply rushing into the store with heavy artillery and running out with the merchandise. Going in quiet, however, requires more planning and stealth tactics. In a jewel heist, for instance, chemicals and an exterminator truck must be stolen. Using the exterminator gig as cover, you head up on the roof with a gas mask and uniform and drop some gas into the vents of the store. Meanwhile, the rest of the crew bursts into the store with similar outfits and cleans it out while the customers and clerks are unconscious. One great feature of these heists is that the crew itself must be individually selected. You’ll generally need a gunner, driver and hacker, who are selected via a pool of known associates and characters encountered throughout missions. These criminals vary in expertise, with those highly experienced demanding more of the cut. Going with a low experienced crew member means that more could go wrong (for example, having a bad driver could mean they get captured and lose whatever loot they were carrying), but the more they are used, the better they get with the same cut. Heists add a fantastic dynamic to the game and make the scope of the universe seem larger than ever.


"It's too early to talk specifics, but definitely all the DLCs and updates will be free. Of course, we’ll see what the platform holders will allow — what we can do for free [on next-gen consoles]. I mean, there are different business models on consoles. From our standpoint, we’ll definitely do everything we can to deliver the same experience across all platfor


Later on, Cheng's men kidnap Michael and hold him hostage in a meat packing facility, thinking Michael is Trevor's gay lover. Cheng tortures Michael and orders that he be executed in a gruesome way (it involves the meat plant), cementing his savage work as a gang lea


We'll get to Michael De Santa later, but for now, we decided to choose one of his family members. Overall, the entire group including Michael, Amanda, Jimmy, and Tracey are an absolute mess of a family. Amanda and Michael are constantly at each other's throats, the kids are miserable and Tracey is basically in the process of becoming an adult film star during the events of the game. Jimmy is on another level though, and is the kind of pathetic savagery with which we as gamers are famil

Pieced together from Rockstar-released snippets and teasers of the GTA 5 Patch Notes V collector's edition, one fan created this unofficial map of Los Santos - redesigned and bigger and better than its original debut in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas . Click thumbnail above to see full-size

Graphically, Rockstar hasn’t reinvented the wheel for the PC version, but the bevy of settings they give allow for great alterations to the game’s beauty. Those with DirectX 11 graphic cards have access to tessellation, grass quality and depth of field sliders. Everyone else will receive the traditional lengthy lineup of options. This includes FXAA, MSAA, VSync, Post FX, Soft Shadows and Quality sliders for Textures, Shaders, Shadows, Reflections, Water, Particles and so forth. Oddly enough, only Reflection Quality, Grass Quality and Post FX have Ultra settings while the rest go as high as Very High. There’s also an Advanced Graphics options which allows for Long Shadows, High Resolution Shadows, High Detail Streaming While Flying and Distance Scaling. Suffice it to say, there’s a lot of options to choose from, so whether you have a budget machine or a high end beast, you should be able to run GTAV in some fashion. While GTAV is visually impressive, there is one final test it must go through: controls. The controls are still relatively preferable on a gamepad, but the keyboard and mouse functionality have been adapted very well in most situations. Driving and flying remain better with a gamepad, but tasks are on par for general combat, if not better with keyboard and mouse. The first person mode is also a great excuse to break out the keyboard and mouse, even though getting into cover is not ideal.


With E3 2013 week out of the way, it's time to play catch-up on a few key news items that dropped before and during the big event. This week's wrap up covers the return of Baldur's Gate and FreeSpace ; cinematic trailers for Total War: ROME II and World of Warplanes ; The Witcher 3 and Killer Instinct DLC plans; two new Trials games; and another high profile MMO going fully free-to-p