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Yeah to be clear I played GTA 1, 2, Vice City, San Andreas and GTA 5, I have enjoyed the series immensely and it does have great biting satire of US politics, but it doesn’t have a coherent ideology, the critique is rather one of pointing out how hypocritical US society is… which is hilarious and great but the bigger and bigger the business success of the GTA series has become the more and more that has morphed into the series being edgey without being actually political in a subversive way.
GTA 5 had some great moments, there is some awesome storytelling in the GTA series, its just I don’t think structurally it is concerned with being political, rather it is concerned with character portraits that encapsulate the hypocrisy, struggle and ego of US culture and the more mainstream that becomes the closer and closer it gets to “edgey without being political”.
Fair, that is an important difference I just think you would be much harder pressed to prove in court GTA has meaningfully increased hateful behavior, in comparison Charlie Kirk was entirely optimized for actuating that as a media persona.
I agree any kind of targeted media that uses real names is a different level ethically, but I can’t ignore the context that in terms of real world impact here Charlie Kirk did so much harm vs. GTA which has always been a silly video game series intent on entertaining people.
Rockstar has always wanted to be edgey without “being political” and I think this is unfortunately the natural end result of that being applied to an ever bigger and bigger business model, an empty mirror of the worst of US culture without any courage even to grapple with it.
The difference between Charlie Kirk and a Charlie Kirk community mission in GTA is Charlie Kirk advocated for real violence, harassment and oppression with his platform whereas GTA is a fantasy video game.
I actually really liked the weird scifish city of GTA2 a lot, it had surprisingly strange vibes.
It clearly wasn’t the developers strength though, they are far better at making cities that are heavily inspired/woven together from chunks of real places.
In my opinion the game that captures GTA 2 vibes best is Skillshot City previously known as Gene Shift Auto.
Gameplay is fast and fun and it is a genuinely good free to play multiplayer game with fast rounds.
Xonotic
Cataclysm DDA
Luanti
Empires Mod
Mindustry
OpenHV
Transcendence
Zeus/Poseidon 3
OpenRA
Panzer Marshal/Open General
HOM3 and similar
Rigs Of Rods
FlightGear
Remnants Of The Precursors
Widelands
Battle For Wesnoth
OpenSpades/ZeroSpades
Unturned
Warfork
Unvanquished
0 AD
Warzone 2100
Beyond All Reason
Zero-K
Shattered Pixel Dungeon
Stunt Rally 3
Slayers For Hire
Gene Shift Auto
Cortex Command Community Project
Omega Strykers
Not necessarily or exclusively? I am talking about tools like this…
https://www.avoyd.com/avoyd-voxel-editor-documentation.html
edit sorry feeling a bit oversensitive this morning I guess
Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic is usually around $20 and seems worth it at that price and it is at $10 which seems like a genuinely great deal for a city builder/transit game.
https://isthereanydeal.com/game/workers-and-resources-soviet-republic/info/
Riftbreaker at $11 is tempting too
How much of a premium would you be willing to pay for a version of a game that stripped out any connection with Ubisoft?
If you answered more than zero dollars, how the hell does Ubisoft make basic sense as a business?
For me, just thinking of a couple off the top of my head I would gladly pay a $10+ premium for Steep (edit Shredders at $17 is a far better deal for this reason than Steep at $3) or Riders Republic if Ubisoft’s involvement in the games were completely removed, I am talking about right now in the year 2025 not even when these games came out originally… they are brilliant but utterly undermined by Ubisoft. I think for the recent Ghost Recon games Breakpoint and Wildlands I would happily pay a $15+ premium for versions that stripped out Ubisoft BS and added good mod support.
Ubisoft is an anti-brand more than it is a business.
The control scheme in Total Annihilation where you can que up lots of commands for units has largely been ignored by RTS game makers except in Supreme Commander and Spring/Recoil engine games such as Beyond All Reason and Zero-K. I think it is a perfect example of why the RTS genre in many respects died after hyperfocusing on making Starcraft-likes resulting in the stagnation of innovation in a genre that progressively catered more and more only to a very narrow range of brains/players who enjoyed simplistic explicit rock-paper-scissors unit relationships and endless fiddly micro.
I actually got doxing/threats of physical violence here on lemmy for pushing back on idiots claiming being against AI was like being racist, these people are insufferable and no matter what they think their intentions are, the consequences of their ideology is a sweeping under the rug of actual injustice, systematic prejudice and violence.
Overall, 3% might not seem like much to some, but again - that trend is very clear and equates to millions of people. The last time Valve officially gave a proper monthly active user count was in 2022, and we know Steam has grown a lot since then, but even going by that original number would put monthly active Linux users at well over 4 million. Sadly, Valve have not given out a more recent monthly active user number but it’s likely a few million higher, especially with the Steam Deck selling millions.
If you like the old-school top-down GTA feel
You also HAVE to check out the quick multiplayer match topdown GTA-like Skillshot City. The gameplay feels super tight.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/308600/Skillshot_City/
Maniac is a singleplayer police escape arcade mayhem game with locked in topdown GTA-like gameplay.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1482380/Maniac/
In a different genre but still worth mentioning for having cool topdown arcade multiplayer & singleplayer combat is Running With Rifles
https://store.steampowered.com/app/270150/RUNNING_WITH_RIFLES
Motor Town is a behemoth, I have driven so many urgent taxi jobs I put myself on the taxi leaderboard for a hot minute without intending too… with pretty much all the driving manual not autopilot which I am not sure many of the other drivers higher taxi level than me do… lol
Yeah, Motor Town is GOOD.
What GTA-like games do you enjoy by indie devs?
The closest I can provide is Wobbly Life which is unironically an awesome physics heavy GTA-like themed around being a destructive kid.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1211020/Wobbly_Life/
For driving jobs, hanging out in a living multiplayer city and driving feel that hits just right check out the rabidly loved Motor Town: Behind The Wheel.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1369670/Motor_Town_Behind_The_Wheel/
Contractville looks interesting but I haven’t tried it.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2698780/ContractVille/
Schedule 1 seems popular
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3164500/Schedule_I/
Inzoi seems like it is similar in the open world roleplaying sense
Funnily enough the one exception to this rule that I probably would have made was BF6 but they forced me to sit this one out by barring Linux users 🤷♂️ So I’m playing Outer Worlds 2 instead rn.
For some good battlefield alternatives that run great on Linux check out ->
Easy Red 2
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1324780/Easy_Red_2/
Operation Harsh Doorstop
https://store.steampowered.com/app/736590/Operation_Harsh_Doorstop/
and Angels Fall First
https://store.steampowered.com/app/367270/Angels_Fall_First/
Yeah check out Inzoi, I haven’t tried it since I don’t really get into Sims type games… but even if Inzoi isn’t a replacement this is a space RIPE for indie game companies since gameplay is mainly about roleplaying, story, mechanics and meaningful interaction rather than cinematic gameplay or insane graphics and physics engines.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2456740/inZOI/
I for one look forward to an explosion of Indie Sims-likes because even though I am not that interested in the genre I can appreciate how massively popular it is for not really being taken seriously by most of the game development world and I think that hurts the artistry and inclusiveness of game development as a whole because it sends the message to Sims fans that they aren’t actually serious video game fans when they are… and there is likely a MUCHHH bigger market than even the Sims can reach here given the genre is so underserved and innovation is slow at the moment (also nobody markets to Sims fans like they are video game fans in general, there is this sense of “casualness” to Sims that I think is silly, casual games are video games and “casual gamers” are gamers, period end of story).
Another game that gives me Sims vibes but isn’t really in the same category is Let’s School, I haven’t tried it but it gets really good reviews as a thoroughly fleshed out school management game where you build a school and try to grow it while having to manage students, teachers and the campus grounds. I think it might scratch a similar itch for people.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1937500/Lets_School/
I also haven’t tried Clanfolk but from the reviews I have read it seems like a chiller Rimworld with a bit more people/family management mechanics. It gets very highly reviewed, don’t pass over it because it looks like anotheerrrrr Rimworld-like. It seems like the house building and people management part of the game potentially might intrigue Sims fans even though it is a survival game.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1700870/Clanfolk/
If you would like a Sims like game but focused instead on “dogs” that also makes you feel like you are on a dose of psychedelics than check out Wobbledogs.
Well at least we got Motor Town Behind The Wheel, I am not sure review bombing that game would be possible. The love is too strong and too pure.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1369670/Motor_Town_Behind_The_Wheel/
What? Just sort reviews by most helpful and set it to a timeframe that is relevant for you.
I make sure to rate helpful reviews or leave them myself, so there are definitely people out there trying to help make the actually relevant, non-loweffort-meme reviews that contain illuminating information rise to the top.
I have noticed it in a targetted fashion against certain games, especially when they are threats to large game franchises that make a lot of money.
For example one of my favorite games Operation Harsh Doorstop is quite regularly review bombed, ultimately I don’t see how people would be so consistently motivated to review bomb the game, attack the developer and attempt to spread drama on the discussion forum unless they are paid. I am not exaggerating, this is an entirely free moddable game (hence why it can be review bombed easier I guess) and it really makes no sense how vile some people are in the reviews. Sure the game is in early access, it has lots of rough edges but the core game is just fun… the way people talk about it in the reviews is truly mindboggling and I have played A LOT of games so I am not just being biased here because I like the game.
I can only conclude that there is a lot of money in multiplayer FPS games and the owners of IP like Battlefield, Arma, Squad and live-service trash games like Enlisted REALLY don’t want there to be a fun, free moddable alternative to their shit offerings.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/736590/Operation_Harsh_Doorstop/
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The last of the old cargo cult is finally converting to the new one.
Good now maybe indie developers can actually do something interesting with VR and begin the process of rehabilitating the destroyed perception it has gotten with the public.