With Rockstar Games' recent announcement that the Casino in Grand Theft Auto Online is opening soon as this year's first major DLC, speculation has run rampant. Players have been speculating about, and hoping for, the Casino since the game was released 5 years ago, and now finally something is happening.
We are yet to learn any specifics about the update, but based on what kinds of DLC Rockstar has added to GTA Online before we can make a few educated guesses as to what will be included. New content has been following a few clear rules for years now and the Casino update probably won't reinvent the wheel.
This seems to be the thousand dollar question, hot on everyone's mind. On the one hand, we have Red Dead Online which introduced Poker just recently — so clearly, the Casino opening in GTA Online means gambling is coming to Los Santos, right?
The thing is that Red Dead Online has encountered some difficulty with the introduction of Poker. Due to the wildly varying laws regarding online gambling worldwide, the minigame has been deactivated in several countries to prevent the whole game from being banned in those locations — and Red Dead Online separates premium currency from regular. You can't play poker with Gold, which is the only currency that can be bought with real money.
GTA Online only has one kind of currency — GTA$ — which is both earned in-game and can be purchased for real currency. Unless Rockstar decides to completely overhaul GTA Online's currency system 5 years into the game's lifespan, gambling is unlikely to make an appearance.
One thing that we can safely say, based on past DLCs, is that you'll be able to purchase the Casino property. Or, rather, you'll be required to purchase it in order to access the DLC content. This has been a staple of GTA updates since Further Adventures in Finance and Felony, where players had to purchase executive offices to access most of the new content.
While players could typically choose from multiple locations and price categories, there's only one casino in the game. This shouldn't be an issue, as Arena War already had a single-location DLC property with the Maze Bank Arena that players had to purchase.
With the Casino property, you'll likely gain access to passive income, similar to the Nightclub. You'll probably need to keep the popularty of the casino high by completing certain missions occasionally. Chances are there will be a casino warehouse involved, since everything has warehouses in GTA Online these days.
As the owner of the casino, you'll likely be able to purchase a number of upgrades for your casino to increase the amount of passive income generated. The flashier the casino, the more patrons you can expect to attract. We also suspect there will be some upgrades tipping the scales in the house's favor — like loaded dice, for example — to increase your profit gained from hopeless gamblers. It wouldn't be GTA without this, right?
Past updates have allowed for the hiring of employees in your properties — researchers, technicians, an assistant — and it's possible the the Casino update will continue this trend. If you spend on hiring more dealers, you'll be able to entertain more guests, which in turn would lead to more passive income of the same period of time.
The interior decor should be up to the players' discretion as well, with there being several designs to choose from. Players could customize their nightclubs, offices and other properties as well, so why should a Casino be any different? It would be interesting to see designs inspired by the world's most famous venues.
You can't have a GTA Online update without new vehicles, can you? All proper DLCs so far introduced a few new rides, and the Casino DLC should be no different. As far as what these vehicles will be specifically, our guess is as good as yours.
However, if the vehicles fit thematically — like the destructive vehicles of Arena War and the weaponized military vehicles of Gunrunning — then the focus will be on opulence and luxury. Limousines, armored SUVs, private aircraft and the most expensive high end sportscars will be on display. These will be mobile status symbols instead of effective means of transportation — form will enjoy priority over function.
We expect the update will also include new weapons, clothing items and other customization options like tattoos.
Major DLCs often contain miscellaneous additional new content which joins the main attraction on the side. These usually appear in the form of unrelated Adversary Modes, adding new PvP opportunities for players to test their mettle against one another in a structured format.
Hopefully we'll learn more specifics about the Casino upgrade coming to GTA Online soon.
