I had read the occasional post saying that the 50 letter piece collectable was worth hunting for. So while it was pretty annoying in having to head over to the living room to read up on the collectibles list on Rockstar's social club, and then head back to my room to then locate it over and over, I thought it would all be worth it and would lead to something nifty.

But of course... nothing of any note really happens. I mean OK, you solve the murder and uncover the killer, but the killer is nobody of any real interest or importance, and I was hoping it would be a more spookier sort of encounter... I got into the mood and everything once the Stranger mission popped up on the map; I made sure to go at night, and I was sneaking into the guy's house expecting some sort of ambush. Instead you meet the guy, chase him down (or not, I guess), kill him and... well, that's that then.

I've still just left there for now, so maybe there's at least an unlockable car or outfit?... Even still, I was really banking on Rockstar using this collectible set to give you a horror themed mission at the end of it all; like, you're visited by Leonora's ghost, or you encounter Dreyfuss on his movie set and you have to try and figure out what's real and what's an illusion or something. They should have at least made the killer to be someone recognisable, and considering that it's a guy tied to the movie industry and Solomon Richards, wouldn't it have made more sense for this to be a mission for Michael instead of Franklin?...

Honestly besides going for the 100% completionist route, it frankly didn't feel like it was worth the effort.

EDIT: Oh, but it at least helped introduce me to some crazy hitchhiker lady who Trevor can apparently have booty calls with whilst I was searching for the letter pieces. So, what are the other collectible 'rewards' like? The Epsilon stuff and the alien parts I mean.

Yeah, it was kinda disappointing, but you could really say the same thing about all of the collectibles (space ship parts, sub parts, nuke waste).

I don't know why, but reading that made me want to play the snuff film set level from Vampire: Bloodlines again. That part was unsettling.

Oh yeah, the only other one I've finished is the submarine parts, and that was also pretty damn anti-climatic as well. Rockstar don't really get collectibles anymore it seems, considering the fact that they don't give you something in-game to locate the collectibles (minus the nuclear waste & submarine parts I mean), or of course how the reward barely matches the effort required. I seem to remember GTAIV having some really weak rewards for killing all of the pigeons, too.

So even the space ship parts doesn't do anything substantial? Given the tone of GTA V, I would have hoped it'd unlock a UFO to fly around in... Or at least an alien suit to wear?

@yummylee: Nope, all you get for the space ship parts is a custom buggy with some ufo inspired lights and doodads on it that makes cheap laser sound effects when you honk the horn. I was hoping that as a nod to GTA:SA it would unlock a jetpack but no such luck.

@chaser324: Oh... that sucks.

I think that hitchhiker you speak of having "booty calls" with was the one that I brought to the cult.

That's the only thing on topic that I can add here. (Well, I did also get all those collectibles, and agree that the end result was kinda lame.)

@yummylee: It also apparently has a bit more "airtime", but not enough for me to notice.

All the collectibles in that game are way too much work for what they give you. Same for the stunt jumps and I'm not even sure that gives you anything.

I found the result of the letter quest to be a bit more rewarding than you did. Probably because I came across the website devoted to solving the mystery and I read all of it. Every time you get the option to let someone live in that game I did, except for Dreyfus.

As for other collectibles, the Nuclear Waste gets a good amount of money. The submarine parts get you $10. The UFO parts is a UFO themed dune buggy which I put in my garage but then disappeared. The Epsilon stuff gets you an outfit and the option to steal 2.1 mil in the final mission. I think Stunt Jumps, Knife Flights and Under the Bridges raise your stats. The Epsilon Tracts get Marnie to stop spaming you with texts and the Hidden Packages are loaded with cash apparently, but they are the only ones I haven't done yet.

You can encounter Leonora's ghost, you just have to find it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoH-cFBdelc

I had already found the ghost, and it's not Leonora, it's meant to be Jock Cranley's wife. If you look under her apparition, it spells 'Jock'.

I was thinking about doing the submarine one but I hate collectibles and this thread isn't very encouraging.

All of the strangers and freaks fizzle out in almost the same way. It's as if they designed it to be like that bnut I don't know why you would want the conclusion to be so underwhelming.

I think the Letter Scraps actually has the most pay off out of all of the collectibles. At least there is some kind of story or something to go with it.

The other collectibles are almost completely pointless apart from trophies and completion: The Submarine parts just result in a short interaction with the lady at the dock, the nuclear waste gets nothing, the spaceship parts get the aforementioned buggy. That's it. All the stunt jumps, knife flights and under the bridge flights get trophies. I thought there might at least be a new vehicle or something.

Having said that doing everything has passed the time while GTAO hasn't been working.

The collectibles in this game is an exercise in extreme patience and tedium. Even stuff like stunt jumps and knife flights, which should be fantastic like in Burnout Paradise, just sucks a giant dick in GTA V. So don't do them.

Just finished the sub parts one as it only had 30 and it told you pretty much where they were. With that I now know I will never do another collectable in a Rockstar game ever again unless I read somewhere that something amazing comes out of it. Such a waste of time...

Yeah they kind of burned me on collecting collectibles in any future Rockstar games.

I was fine with it. I enjoyed the process of hunting all of the letters down. I thought the complete manuscript you get to read was pretty cool. There is also an in-fiction website with more about the murder and what not that adds a bit more flavor to the overall mission and story.

I think the reason why Rockstar don't reward collectable hunts anymore is because of hubris. I think that they're so proud of how well detailed their worlds are (and they should be of course) that the mere act of collecting stuff and uncovering more of their world is supposed to be the reward...

Which in some sense I can understand, as most of the letters/space ship parts are all located within landmarks and stuff. And of course why would you ever explore underwater if not to collect the submarine parts? Problem with that is that you're still going on a tedious collectathon, with no in-game assistance for most of it. If they really wanted us to marvel at more of their world, though, they should have instead put more stuff to do in there, or at least interact with. There's such a crazy amount of cool possibilities littered throughout, like a racetrack and a baseball field and so on. Maybe they'll get around to it with DLC--most likely for GTA Online--but it was both fun and yet really disappointing to uncover so much more of the world, only for it to simply exist as a place to hide a collectable.

I liked this one just because it was super twisted.

I knew about the website, and if anything that only made the end result all the more disappointing.

I don't know, I enjoyed collecting them and the end result when you kill Dreyfuss made me chuckle as well.
He was a cooky little fella, running away, into his car and, oh no who thought ahead? That's right, Franklin did.

Sticky bomb right on that thing. Didn't take long either with a map that showed me the general area of where the letters were and the read wasn't terrible either so I was alright with it.
But yeah, not a lot of "I *insert whatever you did here* and all I got was this lousy T-shirt" awards anymore, but that's fine for me.

Well, hey dunno what I can say. I pretty much enjoyed all aspects of this game. I didn't do the collectibles personally because I wanted a reward I just did it because I wanted to do EVERYTHING in the game because I've enjoyed it so much. So I guess if you were expecting a reward that might be disappointing. I made killing the guy a bit more interesting when I found him though. Instead of shooting him I chased him down and beat him to death with a baseball bat which was pretty great.

Yeah, side missions in GTA V are the most unsatisfying, most unrewarding missions in the entire series history. So much I think it's deliberately so. You never get money, or cool cars, or outfits or anything. Just a big middle finger as the people you work for (or help out) just ride into the sunset without giving you anything.

If GTA V was a different game with the theme of "crime doesn't pay" then all of these would be great. But it doesn't. It's about three psychopaths making off with tons of money and maybe tolerating each other in the process. I did the submarine parts mission and saw the obvious betrayal coming, but is killing that woman really the only thing you get out of it? You get nothing else? Also with the crazy celebrity stalker people. And the real estate guy. And the border patrol. And Tanya. And everything that's not connected to the plot.

I just got a dumb medal, a robe and 2.1 million for finishing a Side quest, so.. at least there are a few that give you money.