If Any Game Ever Needed A PC Port, It's 'GTA 5'

 

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Rockstar has already made an absolutely insane amount of money with Grand Theft Auto V across only two platforms, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, but now fans are pushing for a third. PC players desperately want their own version of Rockstar’s massive game, and are organizing to make their case.

They’ve set up a Change.org petition that has racked up 580,000 signaturesas of today, implying that there’s a pretty significant playerbase out there would wants to play GTA 5 on their PC. And that’s only the people who care enough to actually sign a Change.org petition, there are probably plenty more who haven’t.

While I’m skeptical about online petitions actually getting anything done, Rockstar would be wise to not ignore the PC community in this case. Rockstar has a hit and miss relationship with PC ports. GTA IV and LA Noire eventually got them, but Red Dead Redemption never did. Hopefully GTA 5 will fall into the former category rather than the latter.

Why does GTA 5 need a port so badly? Because quite simply, this new San Andreas/Los Santos map is one of the most vibrant video game maps ever created, and the resulting possibilities for mods are almost endless. You only need to look to the last most impressive video game world over the last few years, Skyrim, to see what mods can add to a game.

Skyrim was a fun game to begin with, but for years now, dedicated players have been making their own mods for the game, dramatically expanding the game’s content with both zany and serious features. And lots of nudity, but that comes with the territory.

Imagine the possibilities with GTA 5. The game would get countless visual upgrade mods for starters, and if the ones from GTA IV are any indication (as seen above), they would be absolutely gorgeous. Current issues with the game like the fact that almost every building is unable to be entered could be solved by mods. New cars, weapons, clothes, missions, anything really could all be added. They could truly make use of one of the best video game sandboxes to exist in some time, because Rockstar simply didn’t have time to make it any bigger or deeper.

None of this would affect DLC which Rockstar is obviously planning to make. Despite the fact that it would sell well, PC is still a relatively small market compared to the consoles. And Skyrim released a ton of DLC amid all the mods, and that worked out just fine.

Obvious I’m not privy to the amount of work it would take to port GTA 5 to the PC, but it would seem like a hugely wasted opportunity if it went the way of Red Dead Redemption instead of its predecessor, GTA IV. Aside from PC players who want to play the core game, there’s just so much potential for further expansion of Los Santos through mods, Rockstar owes it to their own game to see what fans can come up with.