The GTA Online Protagonist is the player-created playable character and protagonist of Grand Theft Auto Online.
The GTA Online Protagonist can be created according to the taste of the player to customize (gender and appearance). The player can choose a gender, parents, and grandparents of the character to affect their appearance. Then, the player can alter the character's daily lifestyle choices, such as time spent sleeping and exercising; this creates the initial stats for the character and and can slightly change their appearance.
History
Background
Very little is known about the player's background, other than that they met Lamar Davis on Lifeinvader and took a flight to Los Santos, presumably just to take part in a street race in Vinewood organized by Lamar. The player does not return to their old home, and stays in Los Santos.
Events of GTA Online
- Main Page: Introduction Appearance
The player is first seen in the initial cinematic tutorial of Grand Theft Auto Online, and meets Lamar Davis when he picks the player up after their arrival in Los Santos from the airport. The two had met on Lifeinvader and became close friends.
They enter Lamar's Emperor, where he gives the player a Pistol and welcomes them to the city. If the character is female, a different cutscene is shown where Lamar will try to hit on the protagonist but fails. Lamar drives the player to a Vinewood parking lot, where they begin to race, potentially with other players competing. Regardless of who wins the race, Lamar sees further potential in the character and introduces them to Gerald, a drug runner living in Davis. Gerald immediately employs the character by asking them to ambush a deal between the Ballas and the Vagos and return the product to him.
As the character gains more and more reputation in Los Santos, they are noticed and employed by powerful people in the criminal underworld such as Martin Madrazo and Lester Crest, and are given increasingly difficult and expensive jobs. They are hired to steal aircraft, wipe out rival crews, and even infiltrate a chemical research facility. The player goes from a small-time two-bit gangster to a powerful figure in organized crime.
Events of GTA V
It is unknown what happened to the character by the time Grand Theft Auto V takes place. Lester still seems to be in touch with the character, and even considered them for the jewellery store robbery.
Character
Personality
The Online Player, as shown in cutscenes, seems to be very calm and quiet when dealing with their bosses. They will take on any job as long as they get paid for their services (much like Claude in GTA III). They are known to keep their cool, especially when yelled at as shown in the initial cutscene with Trevor Philips. The Online Player, unlike most other characters, does not seem to fear Trevor.
As with many other playable characters with in the GTA universe, the Online Player's psychosis is determinant on the player's actions, and is only evident when killing civilians or other players. This is represented in-game by the player's radar blip, which progressively turns from white to red depending on how psychotic the player is. It can be assumed from this that the character's personality is entirely determined by the player himself.
Family
The player can choose their parents during character creation, which will affect the player's initial appearance (a loose composite of both parents, with variable influence). There is also a choice of grandparents for each parent (a composite of both grandparents), which affects their appearance, in turn affecting the protagonist's appearance. In addition to generic people to choose as parents, there is also the choice of well-known characters from Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto IV, and the protagonist of Red Dead Redemption, to be used as parents.
Male
Female
- Misty (Grand Theft Auto III)
Appearances
Grand Theft Auto Online
- As the protagonist, they appear in every mission.
Grand Theft Auto V
- Casing the Jewel Store (Mentioned)
Gallery
.jpg "GTA Online Screenshot - Copy (2).jpg (24 KB)")
.jpg "GTA V Screenshot 2 - Copy (2).jpg (9 KB)")
Trivia
- At the beginning of GTA Online, the player will always spawn in front of a hotel until they have managed to buy a property.
- Lester Crest indirectly mentions the Online Player during the Story Mode mission "Casing the Jewel Store." After Michael De Santa asks if Lester has any contacts in Los Santos, Lester says that he has been working with someone, but that they're too unpredictable.
- The Online Player's signature color is dark blue as seen in the HUD and UI, similar to Michael's signature color, although it was originally meant to be yellow as seen in the gameplay trailer and the HUD of the screen when switching to the Online Player. This could also be seen if you highlight the Online Player in the Character Wheel before the GTA Online patch. After the patch, it was changed to dark blue. This also inexplicably changed the colors in the credits sequence during "Prologue" and "Franklin and Lamar."
- John Marston is the only non-GTA character to be a parent choice.
- The Online Player has some similarities to Claude, the protagonist of GTA III, as they both never (canonically) speak in any of their appearances. In addition, if the player bought the collector's edition of GTA V, Claude is usable as a parent of the Player.
- The Online Player only speaks by coughing after using a bong and rarely makes injury sounds.
- However, players can optionally give voice to their characters through the microphone, noticeable during the shop hold ups where players can shout at the cashiers to hurry filling the bag of money. The character's mouth can also be seen moving in-sync when the player is talking.
- When a player is disconnected suddenly from an online session, their online character will become a normal pedestrian and will walk towards the nearest pedestrian pathway. If the AI controlled character is approached violently, they will occasionally scream or yell and run away.
- Each time the player is killed in a session, scars and skin grafts will appear on the character, starting with on their face and then going on to their torso. They will disappear over time, or if the player leaves GTA Online.
- The female online character is the first time the player has the option to play a female protagonist since Grand Theft Auto 1 or the GBC port of Grand Theft Auto 2.
- In the early weeks of release, there was a glitch in which the character's gender can be swapped out, resulting in a character having a male's head/facial features on a female body, or vice versa.
- This glitch could also affect the character's race. When showering, the character's original head could disappear and be replaced with a black person's head on their original body.
- The player's rank color changes when the player reaches Rank 100, 500 and 1000. It will go from blue to bronze, silver and gold, respectively.
- Despite the player being known to use Lifeinvader, they cannot access the Lifeinvader website in-game.
- The Online Protagonist uses a mix of animations from Michael De Santa, Franklin Clinton, and Trevor Phillips. What animation sets are used depends on the activity the player is participating in.