It's certainly in demand: tonight, before Rockstar's creation hits store shelves, a few UPS workers were fired for stealing pre-ordered copies of Grand Theft Auto IV. There's no doubt it's going to set a new sales record for entertainment product starting tomorrow -- perhaps $400 mil and 6 mil copies because it plays on both Microsoft's Xbox 360 as well as Sony's Playstation 3, way beyond the previous record-holder Halo 3. In fact U.S. retail sales of video games jumped 57% in March, and analysts predict increased hardware sales due to the new game release. So on the eve of GTA IV's release, I turned to my video game guru Keith Boesky, whose company is responsible for selling the most intellectual property and developers into the game business and who has opined on video game violence here as well as on video games versus movies here. Now he analyzes whether GTA IV has really got game:
"To put it lightly, if the other things made for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 are called 'games', we have to come up with a new word for GTA IV. I think the word is 'platform'. By every measure, GTA IV is orders of magnitude larger than anything else on the market, including with the critical scores. The fact you are reading this and know what I am talking about is already an indication of the scale. How many of you knew the second largest game on the Playstation, Gran Turismo: Prologue came out a couple weeks ago?
"The game business quantifies critical reviews and assigns scores. Metacritic.com, which also aggregates reviews for film, television, books, DVDs and music, is the game industry Q rating. The value of the property you are trying sell, as well as the ability to sell at all, is directly related to the Metacritic score of your last title. The Godfather is the only film with a perfect 100 on Metacritic. Today, GTA IV joins The Godfather in the 100 club (The 100 was for the PlayStation 3 version, the Xbox 360 scored slightly lower at 99). This is significant for a lot of reasons. First, GTA IV will have the critical praise of The Godfather, but it will have the box office of Titanic. While the direct relationship is not as unusual as film, it is still somewhat unusual in our business. In terms of the score, to give you a better idea of what a 100 really means, the highest average score for a publisher in 2007 was Nintendo's 75.
"The scale of the praise is not as great as the scope of the game itself. If you are at all inclined to read about games, you probably heard about last year's mega hits, Call of Duty 4 and Halo 3. If you play games, you are probably familiar with the critical darling and lesser hit, Bioshock. Each of these games run between 6 and 12 hours to complete, depending on how you play. GTA IV will take a player somewhere between 80 and 100 hours to complete - if they make it. The other games generate sales and justify a shorter single player experience with multiplayer capabilities. The play is infinite because you are playing against your friends - and enemies - thereby making the game new each time you log on. This is a valid point and each of the games did ship with a number of multiplayer modes. GTA IV trumps the competition again with 14 different multiplayer modes. If you don't want to go on mission, you can walk, drive or fly around the city with your friends. Think about it like golf without all that fresh air and walking and stuff.
"The next significant leap occurs on the advertising side. While most games are trying to figure out effective ways to leverage ad revenue by placing products and promotions into games, Rockstar, famous for turning its back on industry practice, chose the Harry Potter route. If you look at their social network - yes they have one - www.socialclub.rockstargames.com, you will start to see some of the licensing opportunities they created. J.K. Rowling could have put Jelly Bellies in her books, but instead, she created Bertie Bott's Beans, and a ton of other stuff. Rockstar's games have always created their own universe and now, it looks like they are taking it to the next level. The social site includes promotion for the Liberty City Marathon sponsored by fast food joint "Cluckin' Bell Chicken", FLEECA and others. There is also an advertisement for a new card game in the club. They didn't stop there. Like I said, there is a radio network in the game. If you don't like the song on the car you are driving, change the channel, and a new one comes on. If you like it a lot, pick up a phone in the game, call ZIT music service, and the song is tagged on Amazon for your downloading pleasure. There is a lot more, but you can see it for yourself
"The most significant impact will come from the city itself. Rockstar built their own high resolution, on line city called Liberty City. I remember sitting in a meeting when an agent just returned from the set of Polar Express. He was telling the film agents about the wonder of motion capture. No makeup, no hair, no lighting, just capture the movements of the actor, put it together in post, and you have a movie. Image Movers can only put new content out when a film is released, or someone is willing to distribute a DVD. They also can't update the existing content on the DVD.
"But Rockstar can update and broadcast whenever they please. By the end of the year, some 10 million plus people around the world will have purchased the game and put it into their console. All of the buildings, cars, people, streets and even a radio spectrum are sitting on people's consoles. It is a platform. Rockstar has the ability to 'broadcast' new missions or characters into the city and tell entirely new stories. If I want a new episode of Law & Order, I have to get the crew together, pay the actors, hire the location and more. If Rockstar chooses to make a cop show, they animate characters, or draw from the animation library, hire voice talent and send it out to the audience. The low cost would even make the Weinsteins cry with joy. And there is no concern about marketing, your audience is already there, and their billing information is already held on line.
"Imagine if you could make an impulse buy offer of new content to everyone who watched your TV show last night, or saw your film. No one outside Rockstar knows if this going to happen, but the possibility sure is exciting. This one really looks like a game changer - pun intended."
Gee, I wonder if the teenaged dating male is going to reach into his pocket for cash to see Baby Mama or use mommy’s credit card to buy GTA IV? Talk about a product with legs…
Comment by pb — April 29, 2008 @ 7:12 am
So I guess the short answer is a huge “yes”?
And maybe most surprising, it looks like this game doesn’t take the “amoral” approach of the previous ones in the series, it has a real story and characters with genuine moral decisions that have consequences.
Writers who have never played it may have to lay off the knee jerk reactions and whining about how “despicable” it is.
Comment by milo — April 29, 2008 @ 1:03 pm
Yeah, the old way of making movies (paying actors, director and 12 producers millions up front, rewriting the script to suit everyone but the original writer,then paying these same people half of the gross for a limp, lukewarm movie no one wants to see)is over.I throughly believe the film business can be saved but they are going to have to integrate with other platforms (have a day and date release of additional material about the film online). Better scripts which may mean hiring older screenwriters to mentor-train younger screenwriters. Giving screenwriters EQUAL power to the director. Getting better trained (or trained)actors. And stopping the hype! Movie advertising is a joke! When a commercial for a movie comes on and has raves from non-existent reviewers or bloggers and has their names written in 1pt. type so you can’t tell that - it’s fraud and disrespects your consumers. First off, don’t make bad movies. Second, if you do, say so and give a discount to the public. Oh yeah, you’ve heard it before a million times so maybe you should pay attention: Kick people out of the theater who talk and otherwise ruin the experience for others. That’s the main reason people don’t go to the movies. I could go on but I think we (industry people) know what’s needs to be done, we just need the will to do it.
Comment by peggy — April 29, 2008 @ 1:08 pm
What I’m really worried about is what happens when you play GTAIV after June 30th. Will the characters in the story stop what they’re doing and start carrying picket signs?
Comment by Julius Fort — April 29, 2008 @ 1:43 pm
Comparing any videogame to the frakking Godfather!? That is a new low for me. Films at their best (as Mr. Scorsese’s product certainly is) tell stories. I love most of the games he mentioned but even with plotlines crafted by writers, videogames do not exist to tell stories or explore memorable characters. They exist at their very best to get our primitive human jollies off. And whether they do that in sprawling cities or bleep-blooping on platforms stalked by angry gorillas, that’s the MOST they can possibly do by design.
They’re facets of the same moneymaking machine, but filmed narrative storytelling CAN facilitate moments of art, drama, and pathos that videogames CANNOT. And it would be sad to let ourselves be fooled into thinking that they play on equal artistic or expressive footing.
P.S. Your “expert” was extremely selective or ignorant of his facts - Halo 3 has about a bajillion multiplayer modes and missions, and is rightly marketed more as an online multiplayer experience than a single-player game adventure. To the extent that you can upload movies and high scores of matches, and customize avatars online.
Comment by Seth — April 29, 2008 @ 3:36 pm
Mr. Scorcese? That’s embarassing.
Comment by Writer — April 29, 2008 @ 5:30 pm
Hey Seth,
What about James Cameron’s JAWS?
Or Woody Allen’s DIE HARD?
Comment by Drew — April 29, 2008 @ 7:12 pm
Seth,
Thank you for pointing out some aspects of the post which were unclear. First, I did not compare the content of GTA to the content Godfather in this post. I mentioned Godfather as a reference point to show how rarely a perfect score is awarded to a piece of entertainment. I figured a film would be a useful common reference on Nikki’s site. If people appreciate the difference between Godfather and other films, they would be able to appreciate the difference between GTA and other games.
As far as artistic expression in a game, I won’t touch that one but if you do a google search you can find a great debate among Roger Ebert and Clive Barker on the topic. SPOILER: Ebert is on your side.
Finally, with regard to the multiplayer modes, I should have been more clear. While there are many Halo maps and missions, there are actually 10 modes of play. GTA IV has revealed 15 modes to date and there are possibly more. The number is unprecedented. Halo 3 is indeed promoted as an on line experience. My point is that GTA’s online capabilities are more robust than even Halo’s, which is primarily an on line game - and the single player experience is larger than most games for this current generation of console.
Comment by Keith — April 29, 2008 @ 7:53 pm
lotta people who don’t play video games here. All of the recent ones tell stories. EVERY GTA since pt. 3 has told a rich, robust story. GTA IV (which is actually the 6th in the series) is just the biggest and baddest of them all.
My roommate writes commercials for video games and has had it for a few months and it’s positively addicting and engrossing and pulls you into the story like few, if any, films ever could.
Brilliance. Pure and simple.
Comment by manny — April 29, 2008 @ 8:48 pm
“Films at their best (as Mr. Scorsese’s product certainly is) tell stories. I love most of the games he mentioned but even with plotlines crafted by writers, videogames do not exist to tell stories or explore memorable characters.”
I’m guessing you haven’t even played this game? Or did you try it out and think that it had no stories or characters?
You’re dead wrong that videogames inherently must lack stories and memorable characters. What makes you think that “by design” a video game can’t have art, drama, and pathos? There are definitely examples that prove you wrong. You come off as a film snob who hasn’t played any of the games at the forefront of creativity. And sure, there are plenty of games that contain neither art, drama, nor pathos. Just as there are many movies that contain none.
If it makes you feel any better, Ebert takes the same point of view. Unfortunately, he speaks from a position of ignorance, sad for someone so thoughtful on film.
Ironically, when films first came into existence, I’m sure there were live theatre snobs who insisted that movies couldn’t have art, drama, and pathos like a good play has. And you are just as wrong now as they were then.
Comment by milo — April 30, 2008 @ 8:10 am
I have the game, I’ve played it for a good 10 hours so far… and The Godfather it ain’t. If we’re going to compare a game to The Godfather, Bioshock did a much better job of combining every facet of the gameplay experience into a cohesive, original narrative. GTA 4’s storyline, even though the characters are well crafted and written, is not only painfully derivative of previous mob movies but even previous games in the GTA franchise. You do some jobs for a mobster. You get betrayed. Repeat. Sure there’s some backstory and emotion in the characters and that’s new, but it doesn’t feel as jawdropping as many people are making it out to be. It’s not a knock on the quality of the game, or the effort that was put into it… but the game is much more evolutionary than revolutionary. Perhaps there’s some content later in the game that’s going to change my mind — but what’s in the first several hours is more of the same with unprecedented detail.
And yes, in principle, the game could work as a filming platform for stories if people took the time to write, motion-capture, and assemble them (not sure how labour-intensive that would be, though).
And as for the multiplayer — you can’t compare Halo to GTA. The depth of customization and level design you can do in Halo, the fact that you can custom-build infinite gameplay variations, upload and share them on Halo’s networking site, take and share screenshots/gameplay videos (which can’t be done in GTA)… this is the first time GTA’s done multiplayer, and it’s a better offering than most games. But it doesn’t hold a candle to what Halo 3 did. Keith, you may know more about video games than anyone in Nikki’s rolodex, but that seems to come from reading about them and not playing them, because you don’t seem to have a thorough understanding of what you’re talking about.
Comment by MrBartokomous — April 30, 2008 @ 10:58 am
I have to agree with the above post i’m afraid, the graphics all be it a little low res in places are really well presented and the modelling physics in this game are incredible but the major flaw is the storyline, which just doesn’t get you hooked. Before you know it your getting to know a new NPC who 3 missions down the line will get killed and onto the next ect. etc. it’s just not involving enough i’m afraid, at least on San Andreas if you got bored of the story line you could take of on a noce journey far out into the countryside, or climb to the top off a high mountain and find your own little space but GTA IV you are stuck in to be honest is not the biggest city i’ve seen (looking at the likes of Just Cause) and just whrn you climb into your chopper to take to the skys and see the glory of the city from above you are greeted with sickeningly designs glowing re and white lights just floating around the city which i think are meant to represent traffic!! i mean comon Rockstar were talking next gen here not lets just get the job done who cares about popup or if the cars disappear when you get 10 feet of the ground or if we copy a shop and place the exact same one in the same section of the city and don’t even change the selection of clothes in it (Perseus’s or something like that)lol, srry i’m ranting but i feel the depth of this game could have been a lot better, we’ve gone from basic GTA to more detailed Vice City, to for me is the best GTA to date the wonderfull world of San Andreas and now we seem to have gone back in time as far as gameplay (interactivity, Character customisation/ingrossing sroryline) is concerned with GTA IV. My rating for this game would be 89% never in a million years a perfect 10 or 100% i think we all agree with that but again if you like you like. Thanks for listening. Peace out
Comment by Tranced 08 — May 6, 2008 @ 5:06 pm