GTA Online could be about to unleash a mass of brand-new game modes to tide players over till the release of GTA 6.
A year after acquiring Cfx.re, which lets anyone create and join custom GTA servers featuring unique missions and maps using its FiveM software, Rockstar is reportedly on the cusp of adding a modding platform to GTA Online.
However, the new feature may not go down well with the game’s creative community, who can already make their own races and deathmatches. The update is reportedly designed to eventually supersede FiveM entirely, confirming the worst fears of some players who predicted as much at the time of the acquisition.
Its impending arrival (the update may hit GTA Online for PC in early Autumn followed by consoles shortly after) was revealed in a report by GTA news site GTA Focal, which got the scoop from former FiveM developers and Cfx.re employees.
For now, it’s best to take the news with a grain of salt, seeing as Rockstar hasn’t confirmed the introduction of official mods.
Still, any backlash will probably be short-lived, as most players haven’t even tried FiveM, let alone a GTA V mod, which are only supported by PC versions of the game. Joining some of the servers also requires you to first sign up to their Discord channels as a form of vetting budding players.
Think of the mods like the user-made games you can play on Roblox or Fortnite, only on the massive open-world scale of GTA V’s Los Santos map. The best FiveM servers are all about role-playing: players can transform into honest blue-collar workers like postmen or mechanics, police the streets as cops, or travel back to the eighties in glorious Vice City fashion. But, this is serious stuff: Drop the act and you’ll get dropped from the game.
Generally speaking, they’re not that far removed from Rockstar’s latest GTA Online update, which lets you work as a pizza delivery driver. Meanwhile, players have been role-playing on GTA for years, whether putting out fires or hunting down crimes from the driver’s seat of a cop car on GTA 3 or making a point of driving cautiously on the first GTA (just us?).
If Rockstar is indeed adding user-generated content to GTA, there could be a clear reasoning behind the strategy. With roughly a year left to go till GTA 6, the company needs to keep fans entertained on GTA Online - and what better way to do that than to flood the game with custom servers? Thanks to the Cfx.re acquisition, it already has the tools and talent to do just that.
