Build your own stunt race or appear in a mafia soap: how crime simulator GTA 5 has been setting the tone for ten years

The sun has long since set, the nearby shops are closed, and the next day is a normal working day. Yet on September 17, 2013, hundreds of gamers are queuing, from the street to the doors of a Brabant branch of electronics group Media Markt. They wait for the doors to open: they wait for the game Grand Theft Auto 5 . That evening they will get into virtual cars, take out digital weapons, and happily commit crimes in San Andreas, a sharply satirical parody of the city of Los Angeles.

A vast world full of freedoms: that was the promise that maker Rockstar made with the first Grand Theft Auto (1997) dealt with the gamer. But that game was still two-dimensional, flat, and therefore felt limited. With part three, which was completely three-dimensional, Rockstar really fulfilled the promise for the first time in 2001. Whether you liked to drive over (virtual) pedestrians or wanted to feel completely part of a deep mafia story – the gamer asked, GTA turned. Since then, every new game in the series has been an Event with a capital G that gamers have looked forward to for years. GTA‘s philosophy of ultimate player freedom continues to guide the gaming industry.

Evergreen

And so it stands GTA 5 ten years later, still in the best-selling games lists every year; The game has now been sold 195 million times and is said to be the third best-selling game of all time. Unheard of, because sales figures for games usually decline quickly. But the crime simulator has become an evergreen – a dream that so many creators in the hit-prone gaming industry are chasing. Rarely do they manage to stimulate the imagination and interest of gamers so intensely for so long. That’s why it’s new Grand Theft Auto 6which was announced in mid-November, has been taking so long: Rockstar can financially afford to perfect the game down to the last detail.

Rockstar did not pioneer the underlying ‘service model’, but it did manage to perfect it: by regularly adding small chunks of games, enthusiasts always have a reason to come back. The fact that it is difficult to keep the balance right is evident from the gigantic graveyard of service games of the past ten years. How is it possible that Rockstar succeeds?

“Rockstar of course has a huge fan base,” says Jan Caspers, a popular YouTuber who has been posting videos about GTA 5 online under the name Yarasky for about eight years. They buy everything that has the GTA name, he means. “Really not normal. And they release so many free updates. They added hundreds of new cars.”

GTA 5 didn’t really click for Casper at the beginning. “You complete the story in a few dozen hours, and then it’s over. The races were also still standard stuff from Rockstar itself: you just did a lap or completed a course. And then we suddenly got the opportunity to build races ourselves. That literally changed everything.”

Be creative, build things yourself. Since it has become technically easier to make this possible in games, more and more game makers are adding the option. Gamers are flocking to it. The opportunity to express yourself in such a profound way in a game you love, to share those creative excesses, proves irresistible.

“Rockstar just keeps adding new items [voor de bouwmodus],” says Caspers, visibly enthusiastic. “It is absolutely bizarre now that you can build stunt races, where you can do the strangest things with your car, such as driving into the wall. Especially if you play together, it never gets boring playing all those races of other gamers. Sometimes you race against each other, sometimes someone comes up with a track on which you have to work together with several people. All the while we are all shouting and laughing.” They are by far his most popular videos.

According to Caspers, in addition to the updates, it is this creativity and social factor that make the difference. This is not limited to racing alone. The fictional city from GTA offers a lot of freedom to do everything. Those who want even more download unofficial but tolerated additions from other fans.

Server rules

“I started with GTA because I saw how popular the role-play streams were,” emails Canadian actress Ash Ignis. Last year she streamed her GTA sessions live to thousands of viewers on the gaming video site Twitch. She uses the name ArcaneFayth there. She was familiar with role-playing games, in which you create and develop your own characters together with others. “But the combination of role-playing, the existing gaming aspects of GTA and the rules you have to adhere to when you play on such a server, I had to get used to.”

GTA 5 is not built as a role-playing game: you are supposed to walk around, race and shoot, but developing a character or storyline is not really possible. Okay, some gamers thought: then we’ll program those options in ourselves. Interested parties can download their own version of the game and install it together with these additions on a strong computer (the server) and open it online.

Rockstar tolerates it: the servers are simply popular. The offering varies, from additions such as visible smoking and drinking to police simulations to options to work in a shop yourself or buy a house. The precise approach varies per server: some emphasize exciting mafia storylines, other servers think it is more important that a living city is simulated, where players play simple taxi drivers and shop assistants every evening and there is a sophisticated internal economy.

Ash Ignis decided to join the largest and best-known server, NoPixel, because a number of other actors and streamers also started doing so during the pandemic, she says. “It was quite intimidating, to be honest. The world of NoPixel has its own storylines and all players participate in developing them. I made a joke that my character was always kidnapped by criminals.”

Participants in NoPixel stream their individual stories to video platforms every day, like a kind of soap opera. They often have an element of the absurd: one of the most beloved storylines on NoPixel revolved around a turtle. During a robbery, a mafioso’s turtle was murdered. The angry man took revenge. Result: a very chaotic mafia war that stretched over many streaming channels, the highlights of which were ultimately summarized on YouTube.

It became too much for Ignis quite quickly. She only streamed part-time. “Then it is difficult to make yourself part of major storylines,” she writes. “It can take months to years to build relationships between your character and those of other participants. It actually looks a bit like reality, you needs to network, build a reputation.” But she understands why so many avid game enthusiasts continue to watch these GTA broadcasts. “It’s like a series with heroes and enemies, only from many perspectives, created by fans of the game. If your favorite character robs a bank, you can You can also watch the police officers trying to arrest him. People are very sympathetic.”