Rockstar Games has released a ton of details for its upcoming Grand Theft Auto Online, which will be launched on October 1, 2013 and is part of Grand Theft Auto V. To kick things off, Rockstar Games promises that the world of Grand Theft Auto Online will continue to evolve based on player feedback and the company is planning for a constant stream of new content, tweaks and updates in the weeks and months ahead.
At its launch, Grand Theft Auto Online will support up to 16 players in a single world and together they’ll be able to participate in open-world crime and chaos, jobs, races, sports, customization, reputation and cash flow. Unfortuntaely, that also means that Rockstar Games has confirmed microtransactions will be present in Grand Theft Auto Online, something that was hotly rumored all week. According to the developer, “You can either quickly accumulate cash through profitable activities like knocking over armored cars, winning street races, doing stick-ups or a host of other cash-making endeavors – or if you’re the completely instant gratification type, you can choose to buy denominations of GTA$. You will have the option to purchase GTA$ through the in-game Store.”
Planned updates to Grand Theft Auto Online include a content creator with tools for players to tailor and publish their own Deathmatch and Races; a Beach Bum Pack that will feature four new beach fun vehicles, over 300 new items of incredible down tempo leisure wear and two new but not remotely relaxing weapons; Capture the Flag mode which will be Grand Theft Auto Online‘s take on the classic CTF game and Heists, which will introduce full-on cooperative Heist missions.
Rockstar also reiterated that all upcoming updates to Grand Theft Auto Online will be free, which is nice that they’re not DLC. Clearly, the microtransactions for GTA$ helps offset the costs needed to continually updating and expanding the world of Grand Theft Auto Online, so we’re okay with that. And considering the game brought over $1 billion in revenue in just three days of availability, Rockstar will be needing quite the bit of server infrastructure to support all those players.
Source: Rockstar Games
