Comments on Hit Self-Destruct: The Fall

Thank you for so eloquently putting into words my ...

2009-06-09T21:05:06.204+12:00

Thank you for so eloquently putting into words my disappointment with (and, sometimes, heartbreak over) this game.

What makes the whole situation even more frustrating is that the game allows you access to a "free mode," but this is treated more as a glorified multiplayer lobby. I feel like Rockstar could have had its cake and eaten it the game simply encouraged using "free mode" as the safe playground for the inevitable crazy behavior and exploration—jumping ramps, shooting pigeons, whatever—so that playing with Niko might maintain some consistency in character and theme.

Oh well. As you say, if they're determined to force Niko gun down police officers to help out some pals with a bank robbery (with nothing more in the way of apology than "Go back to your families!"), the damage is already done, the caricature already drawn.

I have to admit, I think you've just convinced me ...

2009-04-28T21:46:00.000+12:00

I have to admit, I think you've just convinced me to go back and give GTA 4 another chance to win me over.

I hated it the first time, because I felt horribly restricted by the dull opening missions, but now you've made me question if that was perhaps because I entered the game with preconceptions of what I would be doing. Not that I'm letting Rockstar off the hook that easily - if that was what was wrong then they shouldn't have called it GTA 4 - but perhaps the game deserves more attention.

Question: if some art requires an understanding of art to appreciate (for the sake of argument, I mean the good type that just require the knowledge that you look at it as a metaphor), is it okay that some games need some understanding to truly appreciate them?

I liked this write-up, despite the fact that I nev...

2009-03-24T16:13:00.000+13:00

I liked this write-up, despite the fact that I never felt that Niko was a realistic character. The player's hand is still held tightly as they progress through tutorial missions that teach them how to pick up objects to break windows for no reason. We are quickly forced down a path that demands every enemy must die, while we suffer Niko's assertion that he hopes to make a new life for himself in a new country. Niko's fall isn't as protracted as you make it sound, and the highs the game attains are lower than you make them sound. In short, Grand Theft Auto IV is still Grand Theft Auto. Grand Theft Auto IV still a gutless, scattershot, attempt at building an open-world and the characters that inhabit it. At the same time, Grand Theft Auto IV was one of the most celebrated games to be released in 2008.

There is something deeply wrong with that.

2009-03-24T16:11:00.000+13:00

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For all the cynicism I showed the game when it cam...

2009-03-24T08:29:00.000+13:00

For all the cynicism I showed the game when it came out citing the faults you touched upon here, you have still succeeded in explaining why I need to play it.

I just wanted to say I really liked this article. ...

2009-03-23T18:07:00.000+13:00

I just wanted to say I really liked this article. I'm actually curious what you think of Lost & The Damned and if you think Rockstar could build a DLC model that tells different stories in the same city.

Julian argues that Niko's characterization was suc...

2009-03-21T12:32:00.000+13:00

Julian argues that Niko's characterization was successful for him, others argue it was not successful. This is a kind of evidence that Rockstar is succeeding: really, it's so exciting that they've reached the level of ambition and skill that we can debate about this at all. In addition to all the technical challenges they have to face in creating a game, they have to worry more and more about the same things novelists and film makers do: is the plot starting to drag, are the characters believeable, etc. It's a whole new world (for this generation of games, at least - anybody here play The Last Express? Holy cow - watch the cutscene remix on Vimeo and you'll see what I mean) and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for them.

I wanted to mention Bully as well, but I haven't played it yet. I guess it's time. This is the other thing I love about Rockstar, their willingness and ability to branch out with other games and genres ('Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis'). From a business perspective there's no reason for them to stop making GTA over and over again, and that's cool too. But I think in the next decade, as the average age of the game-buying public moves toward 40, games more like Bully (less sophomoric, more [dare I say it] heartfelt) will only grow in popularity.

Very nice write up. I, too, think it was disappoin...

2009-03-21T11:05:00.000+13:00

Very nice write up. I, too, think it was disappointing to see GTA fall back on formula after such an ambitious start to the game. But they cannot help it that people eat it up. Hell, the only person I personally know who finished any of the prior entries was myself. All my friends just ended up playing 10-15 rounds of psychopath.

If anything, at least GTA IV showed that Rockstar ...

2009-03-21T06:41:00.000+13:00

If anything, at least GTA IV showed that Rockstar can, if they so wanted to, make a serious game. In the case of GTA IV, I think they had the intention, but shied away in the end. Perhaps the reception to GTA IV, and discussions like the one put forward in this post, will encourage them to be more courageous in the future.

I agree that Rockstar can do something greater if ...

2009-03-21T05:52:00.000+13:00

I agree that Rockstar can do something greater if they dropped the old GTA over-the-top-ness. Bully, of all games, hinted at that; I liked it much better than the GTAs, partially because the story and world were, in a backwards twist, less puerile than the GTAs.

However, I disagree that Niko wasn't a sociopath from the start. He left his native home in part because he was a killer. He tried, and ultimately failed, to leave that behind him. I think the way that was paralleled in the game is a great strength, not a great weakness. It works for me that it feels off, that it feels like Rockstar's slipping back in to their old ways, because Niko is also slipping back into his old ways.

The American Dream is greed at the expense of others, and in that sense Niko lives the American Dream to the fullest. He learns early on that it's impossible to live that dream without murdering, stealing, and using other people. He wants to believe he still has a conscience, but that's just his delusion... and yours, as the player. In the end, he's every bot as much a monster as the people he's been working for/fighting against. That the game got you to behave in a way consistent with Niko's fall is a triumph of the game, not its failing. That it lead you from idealism to nihilism means that its game mechanics have affected you, brought you to the ground along with Niko. If that isn't lunarrative harmony, what is?

Thank you thank you for this long, reasoned essay;...

2009-03-21T01:42:00.000+13:00

Thank you thank you for this long, reasoned essay; the game deserves no less. You're so right. There's a second heartache, too: I can't picture Rockstar improving the formula for the next installment. They're in a rut, but it's a rut that (financially) works. Imagine the single-minded determination it took to produce all that vicious, puerile, unfunny parody. What a waste! When Rockstar wants to be they're the Shakespeare of their medium; very few other developers, if any, can touch those first hours of GTA IV in terms of writing, acting, and immersion.

Rockstar, listen to us! I'm not the only person who thinks Saints Row 2 was more fun than GTA IV, even though GTA IV was the greater work. Leave the sociopathy to the Saints Row team, they're awfully good at it. You, Rockstar, can do something no one else can do. Tell your stories. Build your characters. We will still like you, we promise! Keep making GTAs if you want (give us a real sociopath next time, so the dissonance and heartbreak won't be so great) but in time a greater success will come from something more mature.