gta 6 is apparently letting you ditch the mission route and do your own thing

Saw Dexerto's piece about Rockstar giving us more freedom in GTA 6 missions and it's the kind of thing I've wanted since San Andreas. The idea that you can take alternate routes instead of following the exact path the game lays out is huge. In older GTAs, if you deviated even a little during a chase, the mission would fail or the AI would rubber band you back. This sounds like they're finally letting the world breathe during missions.
The police chase part is what really got me. Ignoring the suggested path during a chase means you're not stuck on a scripted route while cops spawn in front of you. You can actually lose them by making your own decisions. That's a big shift from the old wanted level system where you just drove out of a circle and waited. If the cops actually react to your route instead of the other way around, that changes everything about how chases feel.
I remember playing RDR2 and being annoyed that some missions still forced you down a narrow corridor even though the open world was right there. Rockstar has been inching toward this for a while, but it sounds like GTA 6 might be the one where they finally commit. The Extended Look already hinted at some of this, but seeing it spelled out as a design choice makes me more confident.
I'm not expecting a full immersive sim or anything. Rockstar still wants a cinematic story and they'll keep control where it matters. But if they let me approach a heist setup or a getaway my own way without instantly failing me, that's a win. The best GTA moments have always come from improvising when a plan goes sideways. If the game is built around that instead of punishing it, we're in for something special.
My only worry is that "alternate routes" ends up meaning two slightly different roads that lead to the same scripted checkpoint. Hopefully it's more than that. Either way, this is the kind of news that makes the wait feel longer.
Source: Dexerto · Curated content.
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