First the good news about the upcoming Xbox 360 version of GTA V (or Grand Theft Auto 5, if you’re not into the whole brevity thing) — even though it’s shipping on two discs, you’ll be able to play the whole game without swapping discs in and out. The bad news, especially for those with smaller or full-up hard drives — GTA V will require that you install the entire 8 GB of the first disc, whether you want to or not.

While this is not a huge problem for users with ample hard drive space, people with the 4 GB versions of the console will need to add a USB drive to their Xbox just to play the game.

The 4 GB Xbox is still available for sale and, with a price tag of only $199, is a popular choice for casual gamers. As of today, it’s the top-selling version of the console available on Amazon. The Xbox 360 initially required the purchase of proprietary hard drives for people looking to store downloaded content, but Microsoft later eased that requirement to allow USB flash drives.

“In order to provide the best possible experience for such a massive and detailed world, the game will have installation requirements on both Xbox 360 and PlayStation®3 systems,” writes publisher Rockstar games in a Q&A on the game. “For Xbox 360, Grand Theft Auto V will ship on two discs; Disc 1 will be used for a one-time mandatory install and Disc 2 will be used to play the game…

“This initial install will require an Xbox 360 Hard Drive or an external 16GB USB flash drive with at least 8 GB of free space. If using a USB flash drive it must be at least USB 2.0 with a minimum 15mb/s read speed and formatted for Xbox 360 use. A new USB flash drive is recommended to ensure optimum performance.”

So by adding this install requirement into the game, Rockstar is effectively increasing the price for users who have to go out and purchase an adequate USB flash drive to store this game.

The PS3 version of the game, which only requires one disc, will auto-install on the console before it can be played. PS3 users without sufficient hard drive space will need to make room if they want to play GTA V.

Rockstar confirms Grand Theft Auto 5 comes on two Xbox 360 discs, has mandatory install, more [Eurogamer via TheVerge]

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