5. Vehicular Ownership
In the GTA series, youve pretty much always had the option to park a car in a designated spot outside of your safehouse and have it saved there for your later use. However, how often have you taken said car from your parking space out on a mission, only to have it destroyed before your very eyes by a marauding rival gang? Its ultimately frustrating and as a result, I feel very little sense of ownership toward any of the vehicles I drive while playing a GTA game. Red Dead Redemption had it right; once youd broken a certain breed of horse, its deed was then available for purchase in one of the shops. That way, if you ever lost the horse, you could re-summon it by activating its deed in your inventory. By the end of my Red Dead Redemption experience I felt a connection to my preferred horse simply because of the fact that Id owned it for so long. Id love to have this experience recreated in GTA IV; to have the option to purchase cars instead of stealing them, meaning theyre always available in your garage. I understand that some players wouldnt care for this at all, and would prefer to steal what they want when they want. Thats cool. But I also know that others would relish the chance to actually
own something in the GTA universe that cant be taken away from you through gang warfare or your own bad driving.