Grand Theft Auto 5 still stands as a monumental achievement in the gaming industry nearly a decade after its release, but its sequel, the upcoming GTA 6, needs to fix its open-world problem. The map of Los Santos is beautiful and humongous, taking players from the beach to the city to the desert to the mountains and back again. But all of this focus on the exterior environment has left a vital part of the free-roam experience underdeveloped: interior locations.
Although the open worlds in Rockstar's video games, such as Red Redemption 2 and GTA 5, are highly detailed and impressive, they can sometimes be lacking when it comes to interior spaces, with buildings feeling more like scenery than a tangible part of the environment. While both series typically keep interior locations restricted to stores, homes, and mission-specific areas, Grand Theft Auto usually sees less variation in terms of how these places are laid out. This is particularly the case in Grand Theft Auto 5, in which going to the barber’s shop or clothes store in the rural north is nearly the exact same experience as going to similar places in the urban south.
Grand Theft Auto 6 should focus on not only bringing in more variation but an entire slew of new interior locations for players to explore. The open worlds Rockstar builds are too inviting and dense to not let players venture into more areas. With the technology Rockstar currently has and the recent rumors that Grand Theft Auto 6's release date will be confirmed at some point in 2022, let’s look at how Rockstar could amp up its next game with more interior locations.
GTA 6 Needs More Interior Locations Than GTA 5
One of the best ways Rockstar could flesh out the interior settings of Grand Theft Auto 6 is by introducing areas that are completely unnecessary to the main story of the game. These would be locations that do not sell items and are irrelevant to any missions. Simply throwing a few office buildings, warehouses, or restaurants players can mess around in would go a long way in fleshing out the world of the next game, as it would make it feel as if the NPCs actually live there.
Additionally, more locations should be introduced to let players have fun in mini-games. Grand Theft Auto 5 has this in the form of darts in bars, but nothing beats Roman taking Niko to GTA 4's bowling alley to knock down some pins. Having more bowling alleys, pool halls, or even go-karts tracks would flesh out the world of the next game by offering forms of entertainment people would actually utilize in real life.
Finally, adding more variation to the stores players use in the game would be much more interesting and fun. Of course, store chains should not vary that much between locations, but showing differences between a clothes shop in the city versus one in a rural area would go some way in making the open world feel more organic and lived-in. But even if players find that GTA 6 changes nothing about the formula established in Grand Theft Auto 5, it would likely still stand out as a strong open-world experience.