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+--- Thread: Is GTA 5 still worth playing in 2026? (asking for the three people who haven't) (/thread-5.html)
Is GTA 5 still worth playing in 2026? (asking for the three people who haven't) - ice - 06-22-2026
Yes — and arguably right now is the perfect time, with GTA 6 four months out.
The single-player campaign remains one of the best open-world stories Rockstar has made. Three protagonists, the heist structure still feels fresh 13 years later, and it runs beautifully on basically anything — a 2015 laptop or a Series X, take your pick. You can regularly grab it for under $15 on sale.
What holds up best in 2026:
- The heists — still the best mission design in the series
- Trevor. That's it, that's the bullet point.
- The satire, which somehow got MORE accurate over the years
- Los Santos itself — still one of the densest open worlds ever built
What shows its age: the driving is floatier than GTA 4 purists will ever forgive, the mission checkpointing can be old-school harsh, and story DLC never happened (pour one out).
If you bounce off GTA Online, that's normal — treat it as a separate game. The campaign alone is 30+ hours and worth every one of them before GTA 6 resets the conversation in November.