GTA 5 was just supposed to be 'bigger and better' in all forms than 4

A former Rockstar developer reveals that GTA 5's development focused on enhancing its predecessor, GTA 4, by improving every aspect, including graphics, physics, story, and introducing three playable characters to achieve a bigger, better, and more cinematic experience.

A lot goes into making a sequel, and a major part of that is coming up with new and iterative ways to keep the game fresh. In the case of GTA 5, however, one developer claims the driving force was simply to make a bigger, better version of its predecessor.

In an interview with GTA VI O'clock on YouTube, Just Add Water lead designer and former Rockstar Games developer Ben Hinchliffe spoke about his time at the company, including how the studio approached the development of the now extremely successful GTA 5. 

As it turns out, Rockstar's approach to the game was fairly simple, choosing to build on the success of GTA 4, and instead of changing things too much, focusing on improving everything they had already made. "The internal vision for 5 was just to go bigger and better," Hinchliffe explains. "Always go bigger and better, make it more cinematic, make the player feel like they're in a movie. That was the aim, to just push it in every area."

This sounds easy enough, but Hinchliffe was quick to add that this wasn't just a matter of improving on the big things, but every department working to improve even the smallest aspects of the game. 

"You'd have the leads of the different departments, and directors putting forwards how we can push forwards every single part of the game, to the minuscule," he begins. "Details on the cars, suspension, how the car would tip when it turns corners, and tires going down. Loads of little things - how can we make the car tires better, how can we make the pedestrians react better, how can we tell the story better?"

Another key aspect of GTA 5's improvements was the addition of three characters instead of just one. "The three characters as well, that was pivotal, having characters that you could switch between, so we could try and get the multiple endings and the different character interactions."

With GTA 5 already being such a gargantuan game, it's difficult to imagine how Rockstar could manage to make an even bigger one with GTA 6. But with a reported budget of more than $2 billion, if there's any studio that can do it, it's certainly Rockstar.

If you're as excited about the future of GTA as we are, we've compiled everything we know about GTA 6 for you to check out.