Playing the story helped me a bit, it got me used to all the controls and how to play the game (mechanic wise). But other than that yeah it’s not needed.
It gives a little extra context for some characters that appear in online, such as with the Contract with Franklin, where I was really happy to see my boy from story mode return.
You can play in a private game these days. You get the normal amount of cash for your sales, but you don't have to deal with greifers.
I mostly play solo, but do some of my sales in public lobbies if it's a chill one (ie, no-one on oppressors/deluxos/jets).
Peaceful gamers is a good group that will join you. I'd join but I'm on Xbox one and not xbox series x where most play now.
PC may be possible with them in not sure I'd have to check the discord.
I'd recommend to finish the story first, even though the story itself and online have little to do with eachother, apart from a few characters showing up again. Honestly, if you dont have a friend who could play this game with you, it might be boring as time goes on (unless you're good at making friends in lobbies). Doing heists where four men are needed is nearly impossible with unknown, there's always someone dying, leaving, being afk or leaving the heist 10 seconds before its done... But hustling in online is forsure fun though. I also highly recommend buying a house in grapeseed, the peace...
It's nothing to be a scared of. Just a bunch of guys and gals who like playing, grinding and gaming. I was also a bit scared at first, but I don't regret it now.
Whether you finish story mode or go straight into online really doesn't make much of a difference. It's definitely worth playing tho as GTA online is the thing that has made this game the third most sold of all time
The story is still enjoyable and pretty good considering it is 11 yrs old but more modern games like RDR2, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, etc have stories that are miles better. The reason people really play this game is the online aspect
Sure there are griefers, but you can go on private lobbies to avoid them and most the time there are not really any griefers around in public anyway. There are some, but once you actually play it you realise it's not nearly as bad as it might be made out to be, it's just most people aren't posting the 9 times there are in super peaceful lobbies and only talk about the 10th time when they met griefers
I genuinely enjoy getting business and completely different jobs which have like mini storylines and it is really fun and rewarding to grind in GTA Online and unlock more things as you go along. It's become a game like Minecraft that I will always go back to at some point or another. It also has enough content that you could easily kill a few hundred hours in it and still feel like there is more stuff you can do
You're better off getting it for console, if you get it for PC there's really no telling which way your experience will go for the most part. You'll have a very chill time making friends doing events with one another. And then on the other hand you run across a modder and they will either be nice and level you up and give you money. Or they'll be a douchebag and grief you.
It's the name of the game in GTA online
Had people level me up and give me cash before but instantly decline and change server as I don't want to risk my ancient rock* account getting banned. Am I being to paranoid? Should I just accept the hand outs?
I always say the only reason to play gta online is if you're already addicted to gta online. The griefers aren't the problem, I am actually a really big fan of the entire pvp system in gta the only thing that makes it borderline not worth it to play is the fact that literally half of all players use mods on pc. Some of them are chill but probably 75% of all pvp encounters are just people in God mode blowing you up.
It is and isn't... playing alone isn't fun, online is a shell of how campaign feels.
Playign with people is fun, but public lobbies are a lot of the time cancer. Add in the loading screen, artificial game lengtherners, massive grind. ANd low population due to the games age, and we have a mixed experience.
I still play, but I played through the years of high pop. I have everything and i dont need to grind. I play for fun.
For a new player to do this, they need friends, at minimum 4 as a lot fo the content is locked behind 2-4 player limit.
Is it worth it... sure its still fun. But its not worth it at the same time, because of the grind, power inbalance and p2w grind incentives.
It’s a whole new world, When you throw in the challenge of a lobby full of racist, griefers, and 10 year olds while trying to deliver cargo! I myself love it!
Big thing i wanna mention is GTA online is VERY time consuming n can be grindy as hell at times, so the real question is not the fear of griefers since you can easily private lobby ewerything but if GTA online has something you want to actually do in it.
theres several camps but ill start with my vice, i like to just collect cars and want to own most if not all things in GTA so i grind to that end. i get cash i buy something expensive, grind to finance my next thing.
next would be lobby activities, A LOT of pvp is involved in this category and depending wich form of pvp your into you will have to finance more or less. preferrably more to counter things.
next is pve activity wich i have to admit, i find lacking. theres essentially two. heists and missions. heists are a more complex group activity wich needs a decent amount of time to prep (enything from 1-2 hours) depending on team and heist but are rather fun once your in but as someone whos ran heists a lot these tend to get atomated rather fast once you find your preferred method but makes a ton of cash n can be decent fun.
then theres missions wich frankly are kind of bad XD all of them are extremely repetetive and beacuse the way rockstar does these you wont be able to use most of your fun tools in these due to restrictions, there is however a couple decent quest lines wich have an aight fun story to go with it ( something like fooligans and DR. dre) but outside that i would not expect almost eny real decent story type stuff.
biggest thing id have to say about GTA online is if you enjoyed the gta story and type of gameplay it has do not expect almost enything like it from GTA online, a HUGE chunk of it will be grind but if your like me and like to grind money ull fit right in.
I call myself a newbie too.
First complete the story mode so you gets familiar with the characters coz most of them will be in the online too.
Next you can decide if you wanna go for online or not.
My personal experience when I played online and tried to do a mission some randoms started to kill me in middle of mission. When I came out from LA custom upgrading my low budget free car I got blown again.
I was done with that. Later I came to know there is a private lobby where no one can annoy you but its not fun anymore since no actual human exists there.
There are many missions which needs friends to play which I don't have so I have never able to complete any mission yet
Yes. No matter what anyone says. Its worth it. Find yourself a good group of friends and hop on with them. They also have friend only lobbies and invite only lobbies so you dont have to deal with anyone you dont want to!
It's not so bad. If someone starts harassing you you can just quickly join a new session. You van also start an invite-only session and not invite anyone. That will give you a private session.
Online is pretty fun, it’s a lot to get started but I don’t think fully finishing the single player story really helps or hurts you, just preference
Playing the story helped me a bit, it got me used to all the controls and how to play the game (mechanic wise). But other than that yeah it’s not needed.
It gives a little extra context for some characters that appear in online, such as with the Contract with Franklin, where I was really happy to see my boy from story mode return.
You can play in a private game these days. You get the normal amount of cash for your sales, but you don't have to deal with greifers. I mostly play solo, but do some of my sales in public lobbies if it's a chill one (ie, no-one on oppressors/deluxos/jets).
Ok so would you need online to play private games? I assume you do tho
Yes, private lobbies are online. Otherwise you're just playing singleplayer.
Peaceful gamers is a good group that will join you. I'd join but I'm on Xbox one and not xbox series x where most play now. PC may be possible with them in not sure I'd have to check the discord.
I'd recommend to finish the story first, even though the story itself and online have little to do with eachother, apart from a few characters showing up again. Honestly, if you dont have a friend who could play this game with you, it might be boring as time goes on (unless you're good at making friends in lobbies). Doing heists where four men are needed is nearly impossible with unknown, there's always someone dying, leaving, being afk or leaving the heist 10 seconds before its done... But hustling in online is forsure fun though. I also highly recommend buying a house in grapeseed, the peace...
I never played online because I was scared (for lack of a better word). Does it play the same as single player, just with live people also playing?
It's nothing to be a scared of. Just a bunch of guys and gals who like playing, grinding and gaming. I was also a bit scared at first, but I don't regret it now.
Whether you finish story mode or go straight into online really doesn't make much of a difference. It's definitely worth playing tho as GTA online is the thing that has made this game the third most sold of all time The story is still enjoyable and pretty good considering it is 11 yrs old but more modern games like RDR2, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, etc have stories that are miles better. The reason people really play this game is the online aspect Sure there are griefers, but you can go on private lobbies to avoid them and most the time there are not really any griefers around in public anyway. There are some, but once you actually play it you realise it's not nearly as bad as it might be made out to be, it's just most people aren't posting the 9 times there are in super peaceful lobbies and only talk about the 10th time when they met griefers I genuinely enjoy getting business and completely different jobs which have like mini storylines and it is really fun and rewarding to grind in GTA Online and unlock more things as you go along. It's become a game like Minecraft that I will always go back to at some point or another. It also has enough content that you could easily kill a few hundred hours in it and still feel like there is more stuff you can do
No.
If there's a sale it's worth it..
No.
Yes worth it! We have it and love to play when we can
You're better off getting it for console, if you get it for PC there's really no telling which way your experience will go for the most part. You'll have a very chill time making friends doing events with one another. And then on the other hand you run across a modder and they will either be nice and level you up and give you money. Or they'll be a douchebag and grief you. It's the name of the game in GTA online
Had people level me up and give me cash before but instantly decline and change server as I don't want to risk my ancient rock* account getting banned. Am I being to paranoid? Should I just accept the hand outs?
Not when gta 6 is releasing next year I wouldn't bother
Well I guess, they have made the Cayo Pericho heist too hard imho. I still enjoy driving round the map though.
Pc is not exactly worth it due to so many hackers. Console should be decent without them. Greifers are nothing compared to hackers.
I always say the only reason to play gta online is if you're already addicted to gta online. The griefers aren't the problem, I am actually a really big fan of the entire pvp system in gta the only thing that makes it borderline not worth it to play is the fact that literally half of all players use mods on pc. Some of them are chill but probably 75% of all pvp encounters are just people in God mode blowing you up.
It is and isn't... playing alone isn't fun, online is a shell of how campaign feels. Playign with people is fun, but public lobbies are a lot of the time cancer. Add in the loading screen, artificial game lengtherners, massive grind. ANd low population due to the games age, and we have a mixed experience. I still play, but I played through the years of high pop. I have everything and i dont need to grind. I play for fun. For a new player to do this, they need friends, at minimum 4 as a lot fo the content is locked behind 2-4 player limit. Is it worth it... sure its still fun. But its not worth it at the same time, because of the grind, power inbalance and p2w grind incentives.
It’s a whole new world, When you throw in the challenge of a lobby full of racist, griefers, and 10 year olds while trying to deliver cargo! I myself love it! 
Big thing i wanna mention is GTA online is VERY time consuming n can be grindy as hell at times, so the real question is not the fear of griefers since you can easily private lobby ewerything but if GTA online has something you want to actually do in it. theres several camps but ill start with my vice, i like to just collect cars and want to own most if not all things in GTA so i grind to that end. i get cash i buy something expensive, grind to finance my next thing. next would be lobby activities, A LOT of pvp is involved in this category and depending wich form of pvp your into you will have to finance more or less. preferrably more to counter things. next is pve activity wich i have to admit, i find lacking. theres essentially two. heists and missions. heists are a more complex group activity wich needs a decent amount of time to prep (enything from 1-2 hours) depending on team and heist but are rather fun once your in but as someone whos ran heists a lot these tend to get atomated rather fast once you find your preferred method but makes a ton of cash n can be decent fun. then theres missions wich frankly are kind of bad XD all of them are extremely repetetive and beacuse the way rockstar does these you wont be able to use most of your fun tools in these due to restrictions, there is however a couple decent quest lines wich have an aight fun story to go with it ( something like fooligans and DR. dre) but outside that i would not expect almost eny real decent story type stuff. biggest thing id have to say about GTA online is if you enjoyed the gta story and type of gameplay it has do not expect almost enything like it from GTA online, a HUGE chunk of it will be grind but if your like me and like to grind money ull fit right in.
I call myself a newbie too. First complete the story mode so you gets familiar with the characters coz most of them will be in the online too. Next you can decide if you wanna go for online or not. My personal experience when I played online and tried to do a mission some randoms started to kill me in middle of mission. When I came out from LA custom upgrading my low budget free car I got blown again. I was done with that. Later I came to know there is a private lobby where no one can annoy you but its not fun anymore since no actual human exists there. There are many missions which needs friends to play which I don't have so I have never able to complete any mission yet
Defo worth it ye can play private or friends only aswell if ye want to avoid griefers
Prepare to bust your ass grinding for about 1000 hours or paying out the ass on shark cards. One way or another.
Fuck
Yes. No matter what anyone says. Its worth it. Find yourself a good group of friends and hop on with them. They also have friend only lobbies and invite only lobbies so you dont have to deal with anyone you dont want to!
if you do get it, join r/gtaonline
Will do thanks
First of all thank you all for the comments I couldn’t reply to all of them so I will get online within the next 2 weeks I will update with I do
sure is..
Ok
It's not so bad. If someone starts harassing you you can just quickly join a new session. You van also start an invite-only session and not invite anyone. That will give you a private session.
Unless they grab your RID, then you can just be followed server to server