In Grand Theft Auto IV, we walk rather than run. We saunter down alleys to peer at the homeless man sucking a drag from his cigarette. We slow down our motorbike as the mega-screens of ‘Times Square’ creep into view and Billy Corgan laments that it’s no longer “1979”. In a franchise characterized by speed, an unprecedented level of detail leads us to slow down our own movement in a beautiful, sublime virtual world, the likes of which have never been created in a video game.
Amidst the pop-culture and all-access media world that GTA IV parodies, there’s a deep sense of respect for the beauty of our city life. Art has never imitated reality so perfectly. But Oscar Wilde would smile as we realise that our own perceptions of reality are so informed by what we see in art. Play GTA IV for 5 hours straight, then head outside, and you’ll see what I mean. You’ll never take at a walk to the corner store again without having your mind wander back to the game.
The most convincingly realistic virtual world ever created, GTA IV begs the question: what are the differences between the experiences that we can have in the game, and the ones we can have in real life? Yes, GTA IV gives you a city and says ‘Here it is – live in it’. But it isn’t real, of course. It’s a hyper-real reality, in a virtual format.
Theorist Jean Baudrillard argues that we do live in this hyper-real existence – where actual experiences are replaced by simulacra; rather than maintain ‘real’ experiences, everything we do is simulated. In other words, Western society (and perhaps other societies) thinks that it has life all figured out. Reality has been packaged into a comprehensible, perfect package that looks coherent from a bird’s eye view. Of course, this is bullshit. But this new, coherent perception of reality replaces our experiences of actual reality – because that’s the way we like it: instantaneous, direct, and easily possessed in our mind’s eye.
GTA IV is a more literal example of Baudrillard’s system of simulacra. Fittingly, it’s the fourth order of simulacra: after the copy has replaced the original, the copy is copied – and then packaged – for our consumption. In this system that constantly minimizes reality, GTA IV follows the same line of regression.
Yeah, we get a virtual world – a virtual city that feels very real to live in. We drive cars, walk around, run around, watch TV, browse the net, listen to radio, talk to strangers, make friends, buy clothes, eat burgers… the list seems endless. Seems. But we know it isn’t. In the same that reality is packaged for us in a more comprehensible package – where the less understood or considered aspects are simply culled – GTA IV is a virtual world that is devoid of many things. It is this limitation that makes GTA IV‘s virtual world so appealing. In the same way that our fast-moving societies desire a complete understanding of what it is that makes us human, GTA IV offers a ‘complete’ virtual world, with all the limitations of the simulated reality that we conceive in our world.
A limitless, boundless world is frightening. So we contain it. And this is exactly that same thing that GTA IV does. It is a finite experience of reality – a lifestyle that we can enjoy in its entirety because of its limited scope. In the real world, we barely scrape the surface. It might seem strange to talk about GTA IV as a ‘limited’ game, but its breadth of scope actually justifies the discussion.
So what is it devoid of? Is it devoid of emotion? That anchor of meaning that, for many, replaces religion as our beacon of hope in the sea of life? I really don’t know. I could make a list of the other aspects of reality that have been chopped out of GTA IV‘s virtual world, but I would be missing the point when I’ve already made mine.
“Liberty City is a city of freedom, and you can do whatever you want” chirps The Vibe’s soulfully voiced DJ Vaughn Harper, one of GTA IV‘s several eccentric radio hosts. It’s an optimism refrained through the game – the love of living the ‘American Dream’. Here’s a city; do what you want in it, but understand the repercussions. Fancy getting tanked at the bar with a friend? Good luck driving home with police eyeing your drunk-driving skills. Feel like having a fist-fight with that hippy practicing Tai Chi on the beach? Odds are he’s a better fighter than you. GTA IV‘s New York City remains centered on the same essentials that characterize every expansion since the original: fast driving and killing. There’s always more to do than that, but it is the fundamentals that make it an endlessly replayable experience.
In a world full of freedom with barely any restraint, GTA IV draws clear lines between user and character. In the story-driven cut scenes, our protagonist Niko never drinks or takes drugs – he doesn’t beat up prostitutes or crash cars. As a user, we’re given the freedom to do any and all of these things. We buy into GTA IV because we love the lifestyle that it grants. But Niko hates it. Critical of the superficial sheen of the ‘American Dream’, Niko is a man who doesn’t care if he lives or dies, and is motivated only by money and family. How ironic it is then, that we pine for Niko’s life, while he wishes that he lived ours.
Originally published on CordWeekly.com on May 3, 2008.
