Grand Theft Auto V launched over four years ago on PlayStation 3/Xbox 360, and its PlayStation 4/Xbox One port also came out roughly three years ago. Since then, Rockstar has not done a single story DLC. Why is that?
Game Informer talked in depth with Rockstar’s director of design, Imran Sarwar, regarding the success of Grand Theft Auto Online, but they also talked about the lack of story DLC for Grand Theft Auto V. Sarwar said: „As a company we love single-player more than anything and believe in it absolutely – for storytelling and a sense of immersion in a world, multiplayer games don’t rival single-player games. With GTA V, the single-player game was massive and very, very complete. It was three games in one. The next-gen versions took a year of everyone’s time to get right, then GTA Online had a lot of potential, but to come close to realizing that potential also sucked up a lot of resources. Then there are other games, in particular, Red Dead Redemption II. The combination of these three factors means for this game, we did not feel single-player expansions were either possible or necessary, but we may well do them for future projects.
At Rockstar, we will always have bandwidth issues because we are perfectionists and to make huge complex games takes a lot of time and resources. Not everything is always possible, but we still love single-player open-world games more than anything. I don’t think you could make a game like GTA V if you did not like single-player games and trying to expand their possibilities!”
He also added another reason: „With GTA Online, we decided to give our players access to all updates for free, because it kept our players together and allowed to make their own choices about what they want from each update and in what order. Everyone has access to everything, and no one is forced to pay a lump sum for items they may not want or need. With both GTA IV and Red Dead Redemption, we sold DLC and unfortunately both times, it fractured the audience and helped to kill the games much faster than they deserved.”
In short, the success of Grand Theft Auto Online meant no story DLC for Grand Theft Auto V, but at least Rockstar learned the lesson not to make paid multiplayer DLC…
Source: WCCFTech
![However, an anonymous GOG employee paints an even darker tone of the internal situation: „We were told it’s a financial decision. GOG’s revenue couldn’t keep up with growth, the fact that we’re dangerously close to being in the red has come up in the past few months, and the market’s move towards higher [developer] revenue shares have, or will, affect the bottom line as well.](https://thegeek.games/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/the-gog-1-302x180.jpg)
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