GTA:LCS/VCS – Capitalism Allegory

February 23rd, 2010

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It’s seems the harder I squint at GTA’s, please excuse me, f**king terrible storytelling, the more abhorrent and offensive it becomes. There’s a consistent theme though, where your regular, fair-dinkum crook climbs the criminal hierarchy by sucking off his scummy superiors. Perhaps it’s a lesson in power and the people whose inheritance of capital grants them power. In this way, the GTA games could be seen as an allegory for capitalist culture, after all, the radio stations are keen to critique American culture, so it would make logical sense for the narrative to participate also.

In GTA, drugs are the main form of capital. Drugs translate into money which can then be used to buy/facilitate the purchase of more drugs, so basically whoever runs the best drug racket runs the city. You’re goal, beginning from the bottom is to reach the top of the criminal hierarchy. Because GTA’s world is market-driven, you take missions which involve obtaining and securing your capital. Of course, being a game of capitalism, GTA is all about subordination since the weight of power in a capitalist system is akin to a pyramid, where power is held by as fewest people as possible. So, you’re not really obtaining and securing your capital, but the capital of your wanker superiors. (And as an aside, its the flamboyance of these characters which is the bane of my frustration).

Your correspondence between these gate keepers also mimics the capitalist system. You begin as a lowly hitman and climb the ranks, switching to people of continually significant power, until you’re granted a little bit of capital yourself. It’s often at this point where some form of manager steps in to assist in your affairs and the game approaches the final chapters as your connections grant you quick gains.

The most interesting part of GTA’s representation of a capitalist system is the endgame. The GTA narratives conclude only after the protagonist has climbed to the top of the ladder, thereon completing the “game of life”. Toni Cipriani doesn’t simply carry on as a contented hitman or chauffeur. Part of the decision to conclude the narrative at the top of the system is inherent. Games, as programmed creations need an absolute ends, and it’s much easier to justify a position of “maximum” power as the conclusion, rather than simply the contentment of the avatar which the player themselves co-authors.

GTA offers no alternatives to capitalism either, the narrative begins with the protagonist’s submission to a gang leader, the representation of the player’s newfound place at the bottom of the food chain.

Along the way the player is introduced to heroes and victims of the system. The heroes are the drug lords and gang leaders who commission the trade of capital and become the eventual lower rungs. The victims are the rival gangs and syndicates who succumb to the power struggle and the deceased which pave your way forward. It would be remiss of me to forget the real victims, the citizens who become caught up in and around and player’s activities. Most curiously, from my experience—and no, I haven’t played GTA IV—the only time the player’s narrative intersects with the people’s is in Louise Cassidy-Williams subplot in Vice City Stories.

So maybe all of that squinting had resulted in something after all.

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GTA:LCS/VCS – Quick Overview

February 21st, 2010

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Unloved, uninspired, and unsophisticated are three adjectives starting with the “un” prefix which describe my experiences with both GTA: Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories. The “Stories” games appear to be driven by the intention of “let’s try to get GTA III and GTA: Vice City on the PSP” rather than “let’s try to make a fun GTA game on a handheld”. The latter is akin to the sublime GTA: Chinatown Wars.

The worlds, replicated almost identically to their former games, come pre-established. Sure, open world games have evolved since the original debut of Liberty and Vice City, but the cities themselves are more than adequate to meet the occasion. Plus, they provide nostalgia for continuing fans.

The problems lie in the collision of uninspired, one dimensional mission design and the creaky, aged and underdeveloped subsystems (ie. hand combat, weapons combat, targeting, flying). Missions are simply go-here-do-this affairs which fail to take advantage of the world’s assets, besides the tedious drive to and from missions. Often you’ll fail these missions because of the imprecise combat system or wonky mission guidance which has seen little refinements over its progenitors (possibly downgraded from San Andreas too?).

The issues stem from every corner, and really, if Rockstar were going to re-use the same gameplay circa 2002, then they should have at least designed missions which would work around these issues as much as possible.

I hate to speak so harshly, because ultimately these games appear to have just lacked the essential time or consideration in development, or the developers possibly succumbed to the technological imperative of squeezing the experience on a portable platform and left the rest until later. Surprisingly, the open-ended emergence of GTA’s gameplay works to the game’s benefit. Having trouble shooting an unreasonable number of ethnic bad guys? Find a main road and hitch and car to run them down, buy a rocket launcher prior to the mission or snipe them from afar. The “GTA factor” redeems so much of what’s wrong with these portable iterations. The world is familiar, the gameplay open-ended and the city is still an enjoyable place to chill out. However, even by these standards, both games are filler, there’s simply little reason to go back and explore unless you’re a megafan.

Comparing the two games either side, Liberty City benefits from the iconic and overall better game world, and less exuberant characters, while Vice City has a whole empire building sub-game underlining the main story and longer missions. I personally prefer Liberty City because the city feels less empty and the characters don’t demean you so much.

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GTA:LCS/VCS – City Atmosphere

February 19th, 2010

gta-liberty-city-screen

For the past month I’ve been blitzing through the PS2 ports of GTA: Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories. Entertainment is an easily acquired commodity in this modern age, which renders these old-cum-new GTA games closer to filler than enjoyment. I’ll admit. Although they’re still decent, I regret buying Liberty/Vice City Stories, but have learnt a valuable lesson from my bad decision. And hey, it’s not all bad, the low-impact gameplay has allowed me to catch up on a few months worth of podcasts. This is the first of three short articles I’ve written on the duo.

City Atmosphere

I don’t live in the city. I live in an outer suburban area of South Australia. The capital of South Australia is Adelaide. People say that Adelaide is a small “country town”, they’re probably right. Sure, it’s not as exciting as Sydney, nor as cultured as Melbourne, but it’s the place in my head which is synonymous with the word “city”. ‘Adelaide’ connotes all of the feelings I associate with a metropolis, even though it can hardly be considered one itself.

Despite shoddy game design, left, right and centre, I can’t help but look fondly on GTA: Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories, because they too evoke a sense of ‘Adelaide’ as with the other GTA games I’ve played. The connection isn’t complicated; inhabiting GTA’s virtual cities, with all the freedom and degree of realism that it affords, elicits the feelings of living within a city environment. GTA’s cities share the same responsibilities and dilemmas of any real city, just under the context of a syndicate culture, rather than that of a law-abiding citizen. The two experiences are therefore similar.

Personally speaking, the sense of place is a little different in Vice City; I find it less effective because the setting and time period are less familiar to me. That, and the licensed radio station music (a selection of greatest hits 80’s tracks) are horrible. I guess if I were someone else it might seem nostalgic.

You really can’t underestimate the city atmosphere, it’s the franchise’s main hook, and what ultimately kept me on the line throughout a series of crummy missions and derogatory humour, which we’ll explore in the following post.

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