The small details have always been where Rockstar works the most magic, and GTA 6 will be no different. Besides anything else, the weather is going to be something to watch out for, since the whole system’s been overhauled from what we saw in Red Dead Redemption 2.
In Game Informer, Owen Shepherd, the vice president of art for lighting and rendering at Rockstar, divulged some of what players can expect when roaming Leonida, and it won’t all be sunshine and tans. You can encounter all sorts of conditions, ranging from high temperatures to rain, right through hurricanes, all handled by a system where actual cloud formations will be floating overhead.
The entire weather system’s been re-done to allow for more dynamism and unpredictability than we’ve seen prior. Red Dead Redemption 2 is the closest example, and apparently this iteration goes beyond what you see as Arthur Morgan.
The wind and rain are the biggest examples. You’ll see the former through people’s hair and ripples in the water and the like – all the minute ways you’d notice a breeze yourself. There’ll be updrafts and other more specific effects as well. Extreme conditions are possible too; large-scale storms can and will happen across the area.
For the rain, there are puddles, and realistic, persistent rainbows. The notion that I could be stepping away from a hazardous mission, covered in blood both literally and metaphorically, only to hop into my sports car and drive off toward a big ol’ rainbow arching over the horizon is glorious. Pure Rockstar.
As with much of GTA 6, I’ll need to see this all in motion to fully appreciate it. But it’s starting to sound like the studio’s managed to outdo itself here. That’s what 13 years of development will do.