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Rating: Let's clear our minds. Let's rid our minds of any form of prejudice.
Some time ago on these pages, while talking about a video game that had nothing to do with the criminal epic of Rockstar, I made a provocation.
The game in question was Resident Evil 2, and I allowed myself to mention the media uproar caused by the high level of violence in the game, which almost resulted in the forced removal of all copies from stores. Violence was evidently still a taboo for an expressive language as immature and commercial as video games, which were mostly associated with children's products, "new toys." But, Resident Evil 2 was neither the first nor the last violent game in history: violence and video games have been strongly connected since the dawn of time, and, forgive me, it doesn't take a genius to understand that, I'll just mention some illustrious cases; the Fatalities of Mortal Kombat, Carmageddon, Doom, and finally, how can we not mention the two Manhunts also by Rockstar.
From Resident Evil 2 to today, however, more than ten years have passed: the gaming industry has changed, the world too, and thus it seems a bit futile to say that today violence in a video game does not cause as much media uproar as it did in the past. It's generally accepted in the video game medium—and today—the violence present in video games is far greater than it was in the past.
So, based on these premises, analyzing the synopsis provided by Rockstar during the official presentation of the first trailer of GTAV, the "incorrect" saga par excellence, I wondered, since the violent element is no longer a catalyst for attention as it was in the past, what could Rockstar do to surprise us?
At first glance, I thought of the other great taboo: sex. But it was a subject too, too uncomfortable, and let's say Rockstar knew they had already dared too much at the time of a certain Hot Coffee. Then re-reading the synopsis that talked about "an America reimagined by Rockstar at the time of the crisis", a flash of genius struck me
What if GTAV, a video game, REALLY TALKED ABOUT THE ECONOMIC CRISIS? What if, in its small way, a video game really became a bearer of a reflection on what the economic crisis entails in a social structure/society where the dominant value is really money?
Would this be considered a taboo? Would it cause the same "media impact"?
At the time of the Resident Evil 2 review, I did not yet know, and the matter was dismissed with a simple and subdued
"who knows, maybe if GTAV really talked about the economic crisis..."
But today, almost two or more months after the release of GTAV, I can say I have formed a more concrete idea of this product.
In the GTAV phenomenon, everything is about money. But not only "inside" the video game but also around it.
Let's break down the data: a whopping $260 million in production costs alone, one of the most impressive marketing campaigns in the history of the medium, revenues in just three days amounting to three times the production costs—impressive figures, about $800 million earned three days after D-day—figures that make GTAV perhaps not only the most expensive product in the history of the video game market but perhaps also the most profitable at least in the short term. To this "money cycle," we can add the income generated by a series of more or less shrewd YouTubers who quickly seized the opportunity provided by the "GTA fever," filming their own walk-through gameplay, obtaining views, and thus generating money through advertising, and it becomes quite easy to understand how much not only Rockstar earned with such a product but also those who knew how to take advantage in the short time after its release.
Now, however, of all this circus, what appears bizarre, amusing, or tragicomic if you will, is that "inside" the video game, the message is identical to the money cycle generated "outside" it in the real world; we can say that GTAV provides us with a mirror image and less hypocritical view of the real world.
But let's go in order: abandoning the dramatic-existential pretenses of the Bellic epic, made of inevitable tragedies, racism, and grayish tones of a Liberty City tainted by corruption, Rockstar returns to Los Santos and its relative county, the virtual counterpart of Los Angeles, made of warm colors, excesses, eccentricities, but above all, exaggeration, a taste for megalomania.
The triumph of exaggeration is found in all aspects: from the exaggerated and impressive extent of the game area for free roaming, to the enormous number of means of transportation, activities, all collateral but functional elements in painting the context in which the events we will experience firsthand are taking shape. Nothing in GTAV is left to chance: in some pre-launch statements, a developer spoke of "a game world entirely hand-constructed, impossible for a single player to grasp all the details", it is probably true, but this attention to detail does not stop only at the environment. In GTAV, there are even in-game TV channels with dedicated programming and a very dense undergrowth of websites, or even entire short films, whose function is to make the game world more plausible but at the same time to be the bearers of that view of reality typical of Rockstar productions through the sharp irony that illustrates the rot of American society and beyond.
But what use is the context, the environment if there is no adequate narrative structure, if everything seems too dispersed, and Rockstar knows this well by introducing in GTAV not one but three antithetical protagonists by nature united by only one thing, having sold their souls to the god of money: Michael De Santa, a man in his fifties, a former bank robber married with a family caught in the classic midlife crisis; Franklin Clinton, a young black man, a social climber determined to escape the squalor of the ghetto; Trevor Philips, Michael's former robbery companion with a psychopathic temperament now engaged in drug trafficking who has decided to dedicate his body and soul to crime, considering it his personal reason for being.
The continuous alternation through switching of the three allows a new kind of approach to the gameplay characterized mainly by the different perspectives that the trio can provide to a given scene. For example, when breaking into an abandoned factory to save an ally, you can easily switch from one character to another, providing a different perspective of the action. Michael can stay back sniper-shooting the enemies, Trevor can go ahead, and Franklin can offer cover fire for Trevor. The ability to choose freely (in missions where the use of the three is envisaged, however) which protagonist to embody and thus which "task" to perform offers unprecedented dynamism to the saga. To embellish the uniqueness of this "change of perspective," the different special abilities that the protagonists have come in very handy. Each of them can, in fact, rely on a special yellow bar that recharges by performing certain actions, whose activation gives Michael the use of the classic bullet time, Franklin the ability to slow down the action in slo-mo while driving a vehicle, and Trevor the ability to activate an actual Berserk mode that allows him to take less damage and deal more. Obviously, each of these abilities makes one of the three protagonists more suitable for some tasks rather than others.
Therefore, we can say that the change of perspective is the greatest innovation and the biggest merit in terms of gameplay present in Rockstar Games' production, considering also how it is not only functional in terms of mere gameplay but also assumes an important role in the narrative, which appears more "liberated" than those in the past.
In particular, dealing with three different protagonists, although there is a well-established plot, we might in a sense empathize more with one than the other based on the characters we use and the choices we might make. The plot of GTAV focuses mainly on the relationships of the three protagonists and how they decide to confront certain situations. It can be analyzed on two levels, one episodic, the other relational.
The episodic one refers to the events they will face. And here it mirrors entirely the narrative structure of the old GTA: do a favor for this one, do it for that one. In this sense, the gamer will find themselves tossed around in a merry-go-round of events: helping the corrupt side of the CIA, carrying out robberies (these then have assumed an enormous role with a plurality of approach and a planning phase), solving problems in the ghetto or within the family when talking about Michael.
The other, the "relational" one, refers instead to how the relationships between the three characters (who have a life and are characterized beyond the video game) evolve over the various episodes.
In this sense, GTAV deceives the gamer, who finds themselves rather than taking on the role of the protagonist of the narrative that of a director. The false freedom given collides with the limits of the impossibility of ever making the player's will really free in a virtual world. But with the switch system, Rockstar solves an issue of much broader character than GTAV, almost philosophical.
You can choose who to perform a specific action, having control of the character, but when you're not controlling this one, the other two will return to their daily lives because they are "alive" in themselves, and the player is not TREVOR or Michael like one can be a Link in a Zelda, there is a player/avatar correspondence but it is limited. This choice seems confirmed by how once you switch from one character to another for a few seconds, you'll find this one engaged in activities of his daily life as if "he lived" his own life independently of the gamer’s control. This choice is also present in the narrative structure of GTA and is considered, in my opinion, the biggest merit of the product. There's self-reference when as Franklin, we ask Michael for some kind of task, and when as Michael, we give Franklin some kind of task. For the first time, a free-roaming video game allows us to be at the same TIME a Character and a Quest Giver. For the first time, a video game provides this opportunity to be Director and Protagonist of the action at the same time, as if we were embodying both Link and Zelda, and if the plot, the narrative, and the meaning we give to it is necessarily imposed by the point of view we adopt at that specific moment, this is, in my opinion, GTAV’s greatest merit, a brilliant insight that could provide impressive developments in the future and this is why GTAV should be considered a masterpiece.
However, what remains is a game that tends to seem like a GTA San Andreas on steroids, the fair of playing around that does not solve the typical problems of the other chapters, indeed amplifies them given the enormity of the product. When for the umpteenth time we are asked to drive 8 kilometers on the highway to reach the target, the "why am I doing this for the umpteenth time" will come to mind that destroys a priori what good Rockstar has built up to that point. There's variety, mind you, the problem is that the mechanics are lacking, and they make everything inevitably monotonous.
And then there's the other huge problem: I had introduced this review by talking about the "economic crisis," about what GTAV could do to amaze. Here, in reality, GTAV does not talk about an economic crisis but a crisis of VALUES in general. The problems Michael has with his family, the disagreements between Michael and Trevor, Franklin's friends accusing him of forgetting his roots, are all themes that will find their sole means of solution in MONEY. Michael reconciles with his family thanks to his economic and professional success, Michael and Trevor put the past behind them for the sake of a robbery, Franklin buys friendship with bribes. There's a violence in this element much greater than a zombie dismembering a person by eating their flesh, probably subtler to be grasped or less apparent but no less serious: money in GTAV is the cause and solution of everything and represents the only possible and imaginable value in the virtual society represented by Rockstar.
Probably it's the same in real society, maybe that's why no magistrate has ordered the forced removal of the copies from the shelves.
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