The publisher is no longer reliant on assisted aiming, but clearly pretty fond of it.
Have you ever heard Ken Levine talk about the act of jacking a car in GTA 3?
Probably not one you had on your bingo card for today.
“It’s actually a very complex task,” he told the fantasticIrrational Games podcastback in 2010.
Press O to pop fire up door.
Press Alt+P to pull the guy out.
Press G to get in the car.'
Whereas in GTA 3, you hit the triangle key, and that whole thing happens."
“And you get there without giving up the things that give a player a huge amount of choice.
That’s hard to do.”
But the truth is, GTA had been doing this since the ’90s.
While Irrational was working onSystem Shock 2, the original Grand Theft Auto launched on PC and PlayStation.
Both decisions were a mercy considering the quirks of navigating a city from a top-down perspective.
Survival was already challenging enough.
Auto-aim wasn’t just a practical solution, though.
GTA’s developers actively enjoyed the unusual possibilities it afforded - as evidenced by 2003’sManhunt.
TryGTA Vwith manual aiming enabled and you’ll find a perfectly respectable example of the form.
It would seem that Max Payne 3 was a useful lesson for Rockstar at large.
With practice, you learn to turn the systems to your advantage.
With GTA 6, Rockstar has the option to finally do away with a lot of this.
The lock-on showdowns of Liberty City are now truly ancient history.
