GTA V Online: Heists, Was is worth the long stretch for new jobs?

After 18 months of increasingly unbearable anticipation, the long-awaited heists have finally arrived in GTA Online.  With the update installed, you’ll soon receive a call from Lester to arrange a meet with him. “I know you’ve been complaining,” he says on your arrival, “but you weren’t ready.” Oh Rockstar, you cheeky scamp.

First up is a two-player tutorial to recover a safety deposit box from a small branch of Fleeca Bank, which immediately introduces the asymmetric gameplay of GTA Online’s new heist missions. One player drives and scopes the target, while the other completes a hacking mini-game on their phone. When it’s time to hit the bank your team splits up, with one of you drilling in the vault while the other crowd-controls at the front. It’s simple compared to later jobs, but still a good way to ease you in.

Once you’ve completed this raid and proven your mettle, you can  then set up scores of your own by heading  to the planning room in your high-end apartment.

ALTHOUGH CHALLENGING AT TIMES, THERE’S NO DENYING THAT THESE MISSIONS ARE GREAT.

As heist leader, you have to stump up the initial cash to get things running, but you can then assign roles to your team and decide what percentage of the profits everyone gets. Progress is only saved by the leader, so although you can take part in as many missions as you like across the different heists, you’ll need to take charge yourself if you want to ensure you see things through to their proper conclusion.

The second of the five heists involves a prison break, presenting a varied set of tasks for your team. The finale has a different role for each player, so you could be infiltrating the prison dressed as a convict or guard, flying the getaway plane to extract your team, or piloting a helicopter to provide air support by shooting down a squadron of attacking jets. Although challenging at times, there’s no denying that these missions are fun, and you get a great feeling of satisfaction when everyone works together to complete the job.

Predictably, the launch of Heists has created some server problems, and it’s frustrating when you know friends are also playing online but the game won’t let you join them. It’s also annoying when someone drops connection or dies when you have no lives left and the heist is failed regardless of progress, but this just highlights the need to pick your team carefully.

Once these issues are ironed out, and they will be soon, Heists represent a huge chunk of new content and a great addition to GTA Online.

Verdict
The variety of jobs available means there’s plenty of replay value across the many heists. For now, server issues are not insignificant.