GTA Online: How Rockstar Can Make the Final Update Perfect

Final Touches:

Grand Theft Auto Online seems to be about to go into its final iteration, with the most recent update’s story ending with a teaser for a last confrontation with the mysterious Mr. Faber. It’s been a long ride, with many highs and lows, and an absolute pleasure to cover the game throughout – but I have some thoughts on a few final updates our beloved unexpected live service game should get before it’s laid to rest.

This is mostly a quality-of-life and immersion update, aiming to fix and improve various quirks and such across the game’s numerous experiences. Let’s sort it into a few categories:

Vehicular Variety:

As we bellow through the streets of Los Santos, we're surrounded by the same vehicles the game launched with in 2013, with the odd addition of certain vehicles added to the NPC car pool with Xbox One and PlayStation 4 in 2014, and it feels... odd. We need more NPC car variety, using mostly the sedans, coupes and SUVs added over the years, with some additional cars of other types. For example, this could include;

Having the new cars spawn naturally across the city would serve as a good way to convince players to try out vehicles they perhaps haven't heard of, and may even convince them to buy one!

Los Santos is a varied map, and in singleplayer we see different vehicle types spawning in different parts of the map - this still exists in GTA Online, but is much less detailed, with the main differences only being seen in places like Sandy Shores and Grapeseed. Rockstar should reintroduce the same level of detail, with the updated vehicle pools. This could even include new mechanics like Lowriders spawning around Strawberry, Chamberlain Hills, Davis, and Rancho, new Motorbikes spawning in Stab City and the Lost Clubhouse in East Vinewood, or Arena War vehicles spawning outside of the Maze Bank Arena.

This new vehicle variety shouldn't just apply to random pedestrians, though. GTA Online has been updated with a variety of new service vehicles - most notably a whole host of new Police vehicles and cars with Taxi liveries. These should be added to the Police chase units and called Taxis. A few examples of these cars would be;

And why give cars all the love? Rockstar could also improve the selection of sea and air vehicles spawning in their respective locations - bringing new life to some areas of the map. We could see;

Boats spawning more frequently in the ocean and Alamo Sea, including the Marquis and fishing Tugboats.
More personal and commercial aircraft spawning across the different airports, such as the Nimbus, Swift, and Seabreeze. Strangely enough, the Shamal has been in GTA V since launch, but for some reason doesn't naturally spawn in Online. We should also bring back all the airport utility vehicles.
- While it would also be fun to have the massive passenger Jumbo Jets spawning, I think the general scale of them opens up too much potential for griefing and blocking entrances to different locations. While they could just make the carcasses despawn very quickly, I can only imagine the amount of frustration these would cause.
Newer military vehicles spawning at Fort Zancudo, including the Raiju, Miljet, Barrage and the APC, with drivers to boot.
- It's a little strange that we've managed to acquire all of this unique hardware, but somehow the world's most expensive military has been stuck using gear from over a decade ago.
- I reckon a lot of people would be more willing to buy one of these after having tried it out for free. So there's some incentive for Rockstar to stick them in!

Here's something that' you've probably never noticed. NPC vehicles in GTA Online only ever spawn with one driver and no passengers, whereas in singleplayer they can sometimes come with one passenger. I reckon that Rockstar should bring this back into GTA Online, too. Perhaps we could even have a Saints Row-esque "kidnapping" charge where if we steal a vehicle with a passenger still present, we get a higher wanted level. Passengers could also help drivers defend their vehicle from any potential carjackers.

Finally, I think Rockstar should just grant players access to all the remaining Chameleon paints, as well as all currently unavailable matte paints for worn cars via Los Santos Customs. There's still plenty of unused gorgeous Chameleon colours, and a decent variety of unavailable matte colours - including the one used for Trevor's Bohdi!

The World:

Traffic is one thing, but with all this additional variety, Rockstar should also enhance the actual map of Southern San Andreas and Los Santos. I have a few ideas as to how this could be done.

First, let's restore what we lost. If you were to jump back into Grand Theft Auto V's singleplayer after numerous hours grinding Online, you'd notice a bunch of differences. You'd stumble into extra seating areas, drive through a few more road barriers, and probably crash into a food stall you swore was never there before. That's because for GTA Online's launch, Rockstar removed a wide variety of props in order to reduce stress on the servers.

Adding all of these back to Online would help the map feel more full and interactive. We're two console generations down the line from GTA V's initial release on what are now officially declared "Retro Consoles" - they can handle a few more trees.

With this, we could also see the return of the Mount Chiliad Gondola. This little ride to the top of the mountain could be constantly running back and forth on a cycle akin to the trains and subways. It's been so long since I was up there in singleplayer, I actually forgot this was a feature. It's almost surprising it's not in GTA Online.

After we've returned the map back to it's former glory, we could open it up to feature more locations and interaction. If Rockstar were to permanently open Tequi-La-La for us to buy fun drinks or stock up on snacks, and finish decorating the Bahama Mamas interior for players to use as a seamless Nightclub which plays bangers from the GTA Online radio, or even some of Rockstar's CircoLoco tunes.

Of course, some freeroam missions feature Tequi-La-La - an easy workaround for this would be to not allow them to launch if any players are in the bar, and to close it when one of these missions is active. We have missions which work this way with the Vanilla Unicorn.

Player Convenience:

So we've upgraded all of the features around the ingame world, now let's look inward to players and gameplay. There's still plenty of things which could be changed here to perfect the game before it's complete! Let's quick-fire through a few:

As a console alternative to PC's Self-Radio, the ability to remix the radio stations into one with all of our favourite songs.
- I have a few songs on a couple different stations, and keeping track of them is a nightmare. Saints Row handles this amazingly with the “mixtape” station. This could easily be done through the pause menu or interaction menu. Each station could have a submenu where you enable and disable songs.
Text chat on console and enhanced PC.
- Most consoles allow for keyboard input now. It makes sense to have text chat!
- Rockstar could also look into enabling keyboard and mouse support, but I don't know how technically difficult that would be this late.
Rooster shouldn’t cost GTAO$25K to source air freight cargo.
- This is a personal nitpick. Just make it like 15k.
Players could able to purchase two hangars, all cargo warehouses, and all biker business locations simultaneously.
- Really just expand this empire beyond all current limits.
Added Bail Office, McKenzie Airfield, Money Fronts, Agency, and Garment Factory computer tabs to the Master Control Terminal.
- I thought these would’ve been added with A Safehouse In The Hills, but apparently not.
Send-able staff for Nightclub Promotions, Money Fronts legit business, and Tow Service.
- More staff to run each aspects of our business helps the empire grow, and if this can also be ran from the Vinewood Club app for GTA+ players – it only makes the subscription service more appealing.
Allow players who have both a CEO Organisation and a Biker Gang to merge these into a new group type: A Criminal Empire.
- This would have all of the features and abilities of both organisation types. From the payments of CEO organisations to the ranks, formations, and numbers of the biker gangs.
- This would allow players to launch any business type without having to switch back and forth.
Add Bunker / Biker / Acid Lab resupplies to Vinewood Club tab.
- The ability to buy supplies or launch the resupply missions directly from the phone would be a solid boon for players, and also make GTA+ feel more valuable.
Haviland fast travel to Casino, LS Car Meet, Freakshop, and CEO / Biker Gang leader’s properties if player is an Associate / Prospect.
- Why can we only go to our own properties? It's strangely limiting.

Extras:

And now, we have a few miscellaneous features which didn't quite fit in any other category. These are a few little upgrades to different aspects of the game that'll really just tie a nice little bow on the whole update.

First, looking at the Creator Mode: The Mission Creator is incredible - but it needs one more thing to really flesh it out. Players currently are able to dictate the actions of anybody who takes on their missions - but not the reason why. Adding an option to send text messages from any character in GTA Online, or an anonymous number, would help really sell a narrative behind each mission and make them feel much more immersive.

Following this, Rockstar should also add all of the unique options added to the Mission Creator to the other creator modes where appropriate - Props could go into most mission types, the door unlocker / interior function could be added to deathmatches, captures, and Survival modes. Same with interactions, requiring players to complete hacks for unique gear or vehicles in Survival would be super fun!

The next is one for us. If Rockstar were to collaborate with Grand Theft Auto influencers to design custom mod sets cars to be sold at Premium Deluxe Motorsport, Luxury Autos and the Vinewood Car Club, it would be a fun way to engage with the community and send off the game as a tribute to all of the people who helped build the community. Perhaps these cars could come with custom one-off licence plates based on the creators, too. Imagine a full GTABase-themed week at Simeon's dealership, with a different team member taking on each car based on their own personal styles, and a beautiful numberplate in our shade of orange!

Finally, a big one. You know how you can host parties at the Casino Penthouse and in the Mansion? Yeah? Who are all of those people? Why am I letting so many strangers into my house - especially the house with all of my expensive cars and my various criminal businesses? It's a bit strange, given how many people we know - so I propose these parties should no longer feature all of these NPCs - but rather the models of the characters the player has met through the years. Out of the ninety-five original characters we've met through GTA Online, this would include those who are our allies and still alive;

Lamar
Franklin
Dre
Pooh
Vernon
Imani
Hao
Benny
Gerald
Simeon
Martin
Miguel
Patricia
Trevor
Ron
Dax
Chef
Luchadora
Labrat
Mutt
Lester
Georgina
Paige
Packie
Avi
Agent 14
Agent Rackman
Agent ULP
Jodi
Pavel
Gay Tony
Yohan
Oscar
Lupe
Raf
Maude
Jenette
Yusif
Jamal
Agatha
Alan
Capatain Brendan Darcy
Bogdan
Brucie
Bryony
Charlie
English Dave
Jimmy
Lazlow
Moodyman
Sessanta
Mimi
Sacha
Tao
Vincent
Yung Ancestor
Malc
Wendy
Michael
Amanda
And Mr Faber, if he genuinely is innocent and doesn’t end up dead due to an attempt to betray our character in this last update.

Finally, tell us what you think! Is there anything you'd like to see added to the game before it's sent off for good? Feel free to comment on this article below, or Tweet us @GTABase to share your thoughts!