GTA 5: every hard fact, rumour or speculation in one place

Rockstar needs to get off its tush and properly detail Grand Theft Auto 5, already, if only to ease the stabbing eye pain I experience whenever I click a Grand Theft Auto 5 story and discover that it's based on fever dreams and fairy gold. Or even worse - Twitter.

The below round-up of GTA 5 "details" is hopefully forgivable: it contain every hard fact, revealing word and nugget of rumour or speculation to see daylight since I landed this job, updated to account for recent events and broken down by subheadings. Have a read, have a think, and see if you can rearrange the pieces into something more coherent.

GTA 5: the vehicles

Many of the vehicles in the first GTA 5 trailer are recognisably based on models from GTA 4. Highlights include a police chopper, a convertible with a folding hood, a jetski labelled "Speedo Phile 2000", a crop-dusting plane and a luxury jet. Rockstar has confirmed that planes will be flyable. Beyond that, all there is to go on is this, highly suspect list of "leaked" GTA 5 vehicle filenames, according to which you can expect at least 48 cars, five bikes, 10 helicopters, one plane, 25 boats and nine train models.

GTA 5: the story

We know that it dabbles in matters of social, economic and political import, though that's admittedly just us riffing on (a) GTA 4's preoccupation with such matters and (b) Rockstar's first press release, according to which GTA 5 "focuses on the pursuit of the almighty dollar in a re-imagined, present day Southern California".

GTA 5: the characters

The chap who voices the trailer appears to be a retired gangster of some kind - classic GTA material - but casting calls possibly conducted on Rockstar's behalf by Telsey & Company hint at some wackier possibilities. There's talk of "clapped-out" FBI agents, Welsh yoga teachers who moonlight as cult leaders, a "neurotic soccer mom" who's "addled on pain killers", and a juvenile waster who "smokes a lot of weed, has anxiety issues", is "very soft, very opinionated" and is "into making racist comments while playing online". Can't wait to meet them all.

GTA 5: the graphics

Those Californian vistas do look lovely, don't they, but Jonty reckons GTA 5's character models may be more attractive than the scenery. In the absence of any new info from Rockstar, here's his persuasive case from last year: "GTA IV's Liberty City is still up there as one of the most realistic cities ever created in gaming. Rockstar can turn it up some more, but we're into diminishing returns now. The facial and character animation, however, was far less remarkable - and now Rockstar's got experience with Motionscan, it seems the perfect fit. Team Bondi boss Brendan MacNamara claimed as much earlier this year.

"The only flaw in this otherwise perfect theory is that Team Bondi went bankrupt after Rockstar declined to work with it on the next LA Noire, so it seems reasonable to assume that cut things off rather emphatically. Plus, MacNamara was talking about it as a possibility this year; if it was happening, he'd probably have been under a three-line whip not to even countenance the possibility. Where GTA is concerned, if something's being openly talked about it's probably not happening."