Trivial Pursuits Done Right
In Grandt Theft Auto 3, the cars you hijack always have their radios tuned to one of a dozen or so different stations that parody different radio styles right down to the ads. The ads sometimes mention websites. The websites work. For example, PetsOvernight.com offers “Any pet, anywhere, overnight!”, including not just kittens and puppies, but also mackerel, vermin and stomach parasites.
The links on that page lead to the game maker’s home page which is also nicely done. There’s a monthly issue of the newspaper published in the fictitious city where GTA3 is set (unfortunately not updated since Oct. ’01), and a “Rhymerator” that provides rhymes and metaphors for emcee wannabees, suitably offensive; for example, the metaphor it suggests for “love” is “love money like I love my mom.”
AI (the movie) remains the benchmark for using the Web to make a screen-based entertainment more immersive, but RockStar has done so many things right with GTA that it makes you wish it wasn’t such a violent, immoral, misogynist game … or at least not so much fun. It’s like a sexist/racist/anti-semitic joke that’s damn funny.
Categories: Uncategorized dw
It’s horrible; I have been spending my days killing cops in GTA: Vice City for the past week. I can’t believe how fun this game is. Yesterday I was driving in my car and the people in front of me were going slowly, for half a second I had the idea to drive up on the sidewalk to get around them even though there were people walking by. Fortunately the feeling passed.
You’re not alone. I sometimes contemplate just swiping the bumper of the car ahead of me to get around it, thinking that a crumpled bumper is a hit-and-drive-on sort of accident. In most states, it’s not.
There’s also the TiVo effect: Owners want to rewind reality to pick up on some event we may have missed…