Games

Grand Theft Auto 6 Could Redeem One Annoying Mechanic With A New Approach

Published

2 weeks ago

December 10, 2024

While players wait for more details on the upcoming Grand Theft Auto 6, Rockstar Games could finally resolve an unusual and annoying pattern from past games by approaching it from a different angle. As the series has grown over the years to become bigger and better with each new game, expectations are already high for Grand Theft Auto 6 after a decade of development. However, while Grand Theft Auto 5 may have set the current standard for the series, it has failed to address one particular mechanic that continues to frustrate and confuse players.

One of Grand Theft Auto’s most prominent features that’s evolved from game to game is how its NPCs behave, interact, and add depth to the world players exist within. For instance, some fans have already drawn attention to how many NPCs there are in GTA 6’s trailer, while others continue to share clips of NPCs acting in funny, bizarre, or even glitchy ways from Grand Theft Auto Online. But one specific behavior GTA’s NPCs have a reputation for could finally be redeemed in GTA 6 if Rockstar embraces it alongside its many other random in-game events.

Grand Theft Auto 6 Will Likely Be the Inverse of GTA 5 in One Way

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A lot of details about Grand Theft Auto 6 are still unknown, although it seems clear that one part of GTA 5 is set to be turned on its head.

Grand Theft Auto’s NPCs Seem to Target Players

An unusual quirk of GTA’s NPCs is how they behave when driving and seem to randomly but intentionally target the player by crashing into them. There have already been numerous posts across social media where players share gameplay footage of GTA 5 and GTA Online NPCs deliberately crashing into players, with some even creating video compilations of this phenomenon like the one below.

However, there hasn’t been any official confirmation or explanation from Rockstar about why NPCs behave like this. Players have been left to speculate about whether this behavior is intentional to keep its gameplay unpredictable, or if it’s just an unfortunate by-product of the NPCs’ code.

Grand Theft Auto 6 Could Redeem These NPCs With Random Encounters

But while Rockstar could simply fix the apparent lack of self-preservation GTA‘s NPCs have when in range of its players, there could be a more interesting and simpler solution that preserves this NPC tradition without the need to reprogram their behavior. As part of its large, open-world design, Grand Theft Auto 5 includes many random encounters players can come across and have the choice to engage with as they explore the world. Grand Theft Auto 5 featured a broad variety of random encounters and events, with players free to complete these as they saw fit and rewarded accordingly. Just a handful of these include:

Helping a celebrity escape the paparazzi.
Saving someone from being buried alive.
Taking down redneck “border patrols.”
Helping a groom make it to his wedding.

These random encounters are another way GTA makes its open world more realistic for players, as players can freely respond to these events however they wish. However, despite these events encompassing an extensive range of possible scenarios, from chasing down thieves to getting into shootouts, they haven’t yet included the real-world problem of “crash for cash” fraudsters. Yet with GTA already appearing to have its NPCs crash into players while driving, it seems like a missed opportunity to marry the two together in GTA 6 and turn a former “bug” into a tongue-in-cheek feature.

Grand Theft Auto 6 Could Adapt This NPC “Bug” Into A Crash-for-Cash Scam

The basic idea behind crash-for-cash scams is that individuals will try to intentionally get into accidents with their victims and coerce money out of them, such as through the threat of legal action or insurance claims. This would fit perfectly within the world of GTA, as it aligns with existing random encounters and NPC behaviors where players become targeted. Rockstar can avoid developing a way of stopping NPCs from intentionally crashing into players by adding a new random encounter for GTA 6, where players can finally confront these once-buggy NPCs turned crash-for-cash con artists and get their revenge.