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Former Rockstar technical director Obbe Vermeij reckons we won't be seeing a futuristic GTA game anytime soon, given how much some developers hated making GTA 2.
While there wasn't much series convention to blow open back then, GTA 2 took a drastic turn from its predecessor and subsequent titles by taking things into the far-flung future of 2013 – or possibly 1999; Rockstar has contradicted itself on this – and incorporated futuristic elements into the world of Anywhere City. So while you'll still be going around and doing the typical vehicular crimes and shooting guns, you may find an electro gun among your arsenal.
Speaking to GamesHub when asked if he thinks GTA will ever return to the future, Vermeij plainly responded, "No. The team who made GTA 2 hated it." He explains, "I wasn’t on those games but my team sat right next to them so I could hear all the yelling and the conversations and stuff and they didn’t like the idea to go into the future because they had to reinvent everything like how weapons work and everything else."
However, the developers disliking the game isn't the only factor in Vermeij's mind, as he explains, "People didn’t connect with the game or its city as much as they did with GTA 1," saying that it "could be a really big mistake" to set GTA in the future in a new entry. Veermeij also notes that GTA is an entirely different beast now than it was back in 1999, saying that the series "is just too valuable," adding that "It could be cool but you just don’t want to gamble with it like that."
"You’ve now obviously got the cultural impact, which is way more important than it was then." Vermeij explains, adding, "You know, the game generates memes and conversation and hits and clicks and views. You just have far less of that if it was set in some vision of the future, I think." And sure, the Florida Man meme may be older than a good chunk of people who currently play GTA Online, but its relevancy to GTA 6 will make total sense, where future trends are nigh impossible to predict.
