Even though Halloween has only been commemorated by a special GTA Online DLC pack once during its three year run, players are assuming that with the second half of October rolling up Rockstar will release a new update with a spooky theme, in spite of a complete lack of hints, news or even rumors about such a DLC.
Last year's Halloween Surprise was well recieved, adding some great masks, two sweet rides (one of which can now be acquired through a Bikers contract) and one of the few Adversary Modes which was universally liked and is still played by many today. In between the Lurcher Hearse and Slasher, players generally remember GTA Online's halloween event fondly.
That said, there is a chance that the western world's most shamelessly commercialized holiday won't be getting as much attention this year as in 2015. Considering that it took two years before Rockstar even commemorated it in GTA Online, chances are this year all we're getting is the limited items going back on sale for two weeks and a double RP and cash promo for Slasher.
If this is the case, then Rockstar would be taking a page out of the Independence Day DLC's book, which this year was simply a rerun of the previous fourth of July celebration. Seeing as there is precedent for this — though in the case of Valentine's Day, we got proper DLC twice — things aren't looking too good for another Halloween Surprise.
However if Rockstar does release a larger DLC pack to celebrate Halloween, players have already produced several great concepts for what route they should take with the new events and content. Then again, chances are that if Rockstar has something planned GTA Online, it's already through development so none of these suggestions matter — but hey, speculation is nice, right?
A popular idea floating around is for Rockstar to pull a Red Dead Redemption and release an Undead Nightmare DLC for GTA Online this Halloween. In fact, some have theorized that Rockstar has been hinting at this already.
Even though there is no mention of this in the patch notes, countless players have noticed and discussed the fact that NPCs in GTA Online are significantly more aggressive since Bikers was released than before. They are more prone to road rage, more likely to run you over on purpose and more likely to get in a fight.
Some players have theorized that maybe this is a sign that "the infection is spreading", of which aggression is the first symptom, only for Rockstar to temporarily re-write PED AI for the halloween event to make all of them hostile towards players. It might even work as an Adversary Mode in case Rockstar doesn't want to mess with their main GTA Online world.
All this would take is a few new models for the PEDs, an aggressive AI setting with little to no sense of self preservation and bingo. Open up the whole map, limit weapons and ammo, scatter snacks around to add a sense of survival and have a team of four players try to fight through the zombie horde from one end of the map to the other within a time limit.
Another idea suggests that Rockstar jump on this whole creepy clown craze that has been sweeping the UK and USA recently, seeing as the devs really like stirring up controversy. The new fad involves (possibly deranged) people donning creepy clown costumes and stalking people at night to scare them. While no-one has yet been hurt by this as far as we know, it is hardly a safe thing to do.
That said, since the point of halloween is to spook, Rockstar could add — maybe even without announcing it — a feature to GTA Online where when the player is in the wilderness areas of the map and alone at night, there would be a chance for a creepy hostile clown to spawn who would actively hunt the player. The clown would have only a melee weapon, but large amounts of health to add challenge.
Another fan suggestion regarded a mere cosmetic addition, allowing players to have a visual effect similar to that of the Marvel anti-hero Ghost Rider, wherein the character's head would turn into a skull engulfed by flames, and the bike would also combust. While the flaming vehicles could be achieved in keeping with current GTA Online mechanics via tire smoke, temporary character appearance changes triggered by the player don't really appear.
While all that is well and nice, truth be told it's highly unlikely we'll see any of these suggestions come into fruition. The GTA Online: Undead Nightmare concept seems to be the most plausible and most likely to occur to Rockstar as well, however chances are even if something is planned for halloween, development is done and these suggestions can't be added at this point.
Which of the above suggestions would you like to see appear as halloween DLC for GTA Online?
