Rockstar Is Right, Remakes Are “Beneath Them”

thegamer.com:

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition was a game as bad as its name. It wasn’t a trilogy (instead just three games chucked together), it wasn’t definitive (instead just a cartoonish warping of what came before), and it wasn’t good (instead just bad). A large part of this is because it wasn’t made by Rockstar itself, but was outsourced to Grove Street Games. Rockstar devs reportedly felt remakes were “beneath them”. They were right.

Take-Two and Rockstar have always felt like strange bedfellows. While GTA Online is one of the best cash cows ever to pump that delicious green milk, Rockstar has traditionally been focussed on ambitious prestige projects. Red Dead Redemption 2, with its eight year development cycle, is not typical of Take-Two’s ‘fast and cheap’ approach. That GTA Online (and to a lesser extent, the soon to be mourned Red Dead Online) continue to bring in cash probably helps Rockstar’s case, as does the enormous sales figures brought in whenever a new GTA or RDR launches.

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The fact GTA 5 has been ported to every known system in the galaxy from the PS5 to your grandma’s medic alert bracelet feels like a compromise. Ports of new games, especially to more powerful systems, is relatively simple work in the complex land of game development. Rockstar can do it with its eyes closed (and presumably its nose held), and Take-Two keeps filling its coffers. The remakes though would have taken much more work. The story goes that Take-Two asked Rockstar for remakes, and Rockstar refused. If that’s true, then good for Rockstar.

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition would undoubtedly have been better with