(Originally published to Glitchwave on 5/27/2025)
[Image from glitchwave.com]
Grand Theft Auto V
Developer: Rockstar
Publisher: Rockstar
Genre(s): Open World
Platforms: PS3, Xbox 360, PS4, Xbox One, PC
Release Date: September 17, 2013
Grand Theft Auto V has not aged particularly well. This isn’t to say that 2013 is now an ancient period of the medium, as plenty of other games released the same year still uphold the modern standard of gaming proficiency. This also isn’t to say that GTA V has pruned up while its peers retain their youthful luster past their prime generation either, as the high-definition visuals of GTA V are still astounding. I’m also not accounting for my own personal history with GTA V in my opening statement either. The “fifth” entry in this trailblazing Rockstar franchise was the very first M-rated game I purchased on my own without supervision at the age of 17 when it was released. Now, as of writing this, my 30s are creeping on me so suddenly that I can taste the oncoming arthritis in my knees. So, with all of the counterevidence I’ve given and anecdotes I’ve retracted, why am I introducing this modern classic with such a dismissive stance? Because GTA V has greatly overstayed its welcome. You see, GTA V exhibits what I call a “Van Wilder complex,” referring to the comedy film where a man maintains his status as a college senior despite advancing past the acceptable age to still be indulging in the spoils of campus life. It’s still drinking itself silly every other night and hooting and hollering at the prevailing drunken debauchery, even though most of its peers of the same age have settled down with their careers and prospective marital partners. It’s not a decrepit geezer by any means, but the noticeable signs of slight aging make his behavior rather unbecoming. Still, in the case of GTA V, it has to maintain the mantle of fraternity life because there haven’t been any new members to succeed its once-mighty reign, so it can finally retire. Failing to claim a successor has also sprouted some complications over time, namely that GTA V’s content represents the ideals of a newly bygone era that are no longer kosher in our age of heightened sensitivities. Lastly, and it’s the aspect of GTA V’s prolonged legacy that rubs me the wrongest, is that it is widely considered to be the greatest outing in the franchise. This stems from a trend across the series titles in which every entry tends to surpass the previous one on a technical level and the overall scale of freedom the game facilitates. Initially, GTA V might have seemed to fit the trend splendidly. With hindsight, even without a successor to compare to, it’s obvious to me that it never should’ve been held in such high regard in the first place.
I guess I’ll summarize my overall assessment of GTA V by borrowing the analogous insights from master American filmmaker Martin Scorsese: GTA V is akin to an amusement park ride, a rollercoaster whose adrenaline-pumping thrills are potent, yet are admittedly cheap and fleeting. Unadulterated mayhem has always been synonymous with the Grand Theft Auto series, and I suppose one can just toss their brain aside like a pair of shoes in a pool locker room when reveling in the anarchic bedlam. Still, despite the fact that the player always had an endless opportunity to mindlessly spill the blood of innocent bystanders, rinsing and repeating when confronted with overwhelming police blowback, each game offered something substantial in its narrative that dug into a layer of substance beyond the superficial playground of murder on the surface. Players always came for the carnage, but the game implored them to stay for the protagonist's growth arcs, character interactions that tactfully balanced drama and humor, and biting social satire on modern American society at large. Not to mention, progressing each game’s story always unlocked a plethora of new features, areas, and finances to diversify and expand the scope and scale of said carnage. As noted in my comparison, the prevailing issue surrounding GTA V is that progressing through the game’s narrative seems more like a formality than ever, an obligation that is treated like a secondary lark instead of the primary driving force of the game. Never before has a GTA campaign felt so haphazardly composed. Its characters, missions, and overall structure not only fail to reach the remarkable pillar of interactive storytelling in GTA IV, but seem to lower all of the bars in these regards to a degree that is immeasurably disappointing.
I could comment that the game’s introductory prologue mission is indicative of GTA V’s lack of tact, but it does sufficiently set the scene for the major characters and sets an overarching conflict premise for the duration of the narrative. One could even make the argument that it resembles the beginning cutscenes of the older (3D) GTA games, as opposed to the protagonist arriving at his destination with varying contextual setups like in San Andreas and GTA IV. Immediately, GTA V begins guns blazing, literally, with a robbery conducted by three men that has become increasingly turbulent with the interruption of a police squadron. During their getaway, one man is shot dead while another’s fate is hanging in the balance when he’s incapacitated by another bullet. With the screen shifting to a grave being lowered into the earth during a funeral service, we’re meant to believe that the man perished in the police fire. However, the man whom everyone suspects is being buried is alive and well and watching the ceremony from afar, suggesting that he’s slyly eluding the legal ramifications of his actions and starting his life anew. A decade later, Michael Townley, the man who cheated the law and has changed his name to “Michael De Santa,” is emphatically griping to a shrink about his family. A criminal seeking professional help to deal with feelings of stress and anxiety? Does “Woke Up This Morning” play as he drives home from this session? I kid, but believe me, the Sopranos comparisons will arise in due time. GTA V’s tutorial mission is an adrenaline hook that effectively reels the player into the game like sticking a trout through the eye, and I’d rather be introduced to the core conflict premise that set the stage for the game’s future events in an interactive manner rather than having to imagine it for myself through spoken exposition. Still, if you’ve played through the game before, you know that pumping the high-octane action to this extent before the player has a second to breathe or blink is indicative of GTA V’s lack of self-restraint that persists throughout the game.
GTA V’s prologue mission also might be slightly misleading to some players in terms of where the game primarily takes place, provided they ignored the gobs of trailer content that Rockstar excreted onto the public in anticipation of the final product’s release. No, GTA V hasn’t reverted to the snowy, rural countryside in a subversive series first, as the all-purpose depiction of the midwestern region of the USA in North Yankton has served its role in contrasting the humble origins of the main characters to the congested urbanity they’ve absconded to. The extravagant concrete jungle in question is Los Santos, Rockstar’s depiction of the sunny, “city of angels” celebrity mecca located in the fictional state of San Andreas. Evidently, Rockstar’s prerogative in developing their works in high definition is to give every urban environment they’ve rendered a makeover, brushing away the grains of primitive polygons to uncover a crisp, glossy sheen of heightened graphical realism. While the high-definition graphics certainly make the environment and its denizens more appealing to look at compared to the subdued, blotchy lens we’re accustomed to looking through from San Andreas on the PS2, GTA V’s next-generation refurbishment extends far beyond nipping and tucking the visuals. With the HD hardware of seventh-generation consoles, the three borough grid of Liberty City that vaguely resembled the USA’s most populated metropolitan area was painstakingly reconstructed as practically a digital simulacrum of the Big Apple, complete with the heinous congestion of traffic and dizzyingly roundabout highway system. In GTA V, Los Santos has been given the same treatment as the urban USA area located on the opposite side of the country, broadening the expanse of the city by widening its perimeter and fleshing out the architecture and other setpieces with exquisite detail. The downtown section of Los Santos sees several shining skyscrapers looking over bustling city streets with people conversing over chai lattes, the beaches and their boardwalks see droves of people playing volleyball and sunbathing, and the houses residing alongside the Hollywood (Vinewood) Hills have never looked so opulent. The Los Santos equivalent of the Playboy Mansion is even rendered somewhere in the city as an easter egg, whose topless tarts running about the pool area test the thresholds of gaming censorship as the series is known to provoke. Nothing this frivolous, yet finely realized, could have ever been rendered in San Andreas on sixth-generation hardware. The depressing, gray and brown haze that permeated GTA IV’s visuals has also been washed away, with Los Santos’ sunshine radiating incessantly. Some may define this as a sorely-needed quality-of-life enhancement that was actively decided by the developers, but this pleasant weather condition is a natural occurrence for a map modeled after a city in southern California, as opposed to the temperate, northern NYC. As marvelously spacious and crisp Los Santos is looking in high definition, one aspect of its reworking is how it changes the scope of the city from when it was last constructed. In San Andreas, Grove Street and the surrounding ghettos served as the nucleus of Los Santos, with ritzier places of the city feeling outside of its jurisdiction due to how disparate it was to CJ’s general surroundings. With Ganton and Idlewood becoming mingled in with the rest of Los Santos’ districts in terms of precedence, the city finally feels like a unified metropolitan monolith.
The map of San Andreas did admittedly extend far beyond the city limits of CJ’s hometown hub to two other urban areas inspired by more major cities that fall under the Pacific time zone. Sadly, we are not granted the privilege of seeing San Fierro and Las Venturas with a glorious graphical rehaul, as Los Santos maintains its focal point as GTA V’s primary epicenter for the duration of the game. Still, the entirety of the game’s map does offer alternate areas that deviate from the urban sprawl. GTA V reinstates the rural areas situated directly outside the borders of Los Santos that were present in San Andreas, with the contrast being more prominent than it was previously, given that they’ve also been expanded to encompass half of the entire map. Every step north of the Los Santos city limits becomes more modest and desolate, reaching the realm of Blaine County. The unpretentious district that directly juxtaposes the glitz and glamour of Los Santos comprises the trailer-infested, desiccated desert town of Sandy Shores, the farmland of Grapeseed, and the rustic, salt-of-the-earth town of Paleto Bay that will remind most returning players of the quiet, redneck burgs of San Andreas’ Red County. Blaine County also encompasses plenty of natural geographical locations such as Raton Canyon, several mountain ranges, and the Alamo Sea, whose branching rivers run all the way to the rocky shores of North Chumash to the west. The notable residential areas of Blaine County, with their own distinct zip codes, present enough map diversity to distract oneself from the noise pollution of Los Santos, but all of the more organic land surrounding it exposes a grave oversight with GTA V’s map. Their ambitions to broaden Los Santos and its neighboring rural stretches to unprecedented lengths have resulted in much of the map being nothing but vacant space. Sure, it’s logical that there would be some spots with little to no activity, but if I had to wager an approximation, the total percentage of natural land that comprises GTA V’s map is more than just half. From a gameplay perspective, traversing through miles and miles of rugged, empty terrain for the sake of geographical consistency is incredibly dull and tedious. At least have the decency to designate this type of terrain to a single, contained area of the map instead of bordering almost every significant place on the map around it.
Placing the player in a glossier version of a playground they have fond, sentimental memories of wreaking havoc in is all fine and dandy, but it’s the new features that every sequel bestows that truly prevent the player from reverting back to the old murder machines. In GTA V’s case, the game needed enough content to fill in the vacancies left by the inordinate range of hilly peaks that encircle Los Santos. Rockstar’s solution that slightly adds some character to the desolate places is the inclusion of wild animals. Elk, coyotes, jackrabbits, etc., will be roaming around the elevated plains of their natural habitats, while more domestic animals like dogs, cats, and rats can be found on the streets of Los Santos. God forbid you encounter a cougar while hiking up a steep mountain trail, for the rancorous, bloodthirsty beast will never hesitate to send you straight to the nearest hospital (which, considering how remote their territory tends to be, is not a quick trip). Full disclosure, yes: any animal one finds around can be exterminated as easily as any of the humans the series is used to serving up as impulse fodder. If killing and skinning animals in Red Dead Redemption didn’t provoke the wrath of PETA, then they figured it was fair game to finally transfer less capable creatures into the fray of their longest-running series free of consequence. However, one particular animal is completely immune to all potential harm, and that’s a rottweiler named Chop. Owned by Lamar but commanded by Franklin, the latter character can choose to have the pooch accompany him to sic the scrotums of all that come across him. If the player so chooses, they can interactively do Franklin’s bidding by looking through Chop’s perspective, which is only used for a single mission. Playing fetch with Chop is also a little lark of a pastime to increase the bond between Franklin and his furry, shockingly deadly companion. If calling Chop proves to be too inconvenient in the midst of action, each character’s “superpower” will certainly be useful in a pinch. Essentially, GTA V rebrands the “deadeye” feature from Red Dead Redemption, where a character can engage an extraordinary ability for a brief moment that allows for adrenalized moments to be more manageable. In addition to Michael’s move that blatantly copies John Marston’s “deadeye,” slackening the traffic around Franklin on the road so he’s able to swerve and turn smoothly while driving, plus Trevor’s “rage mode” that increases both his defense and offense, are all ridiculous from a conceptual standpoint. The “deadeye” mechanic naturally fit John Marston’s role as a gunslinger in the wild west, so it gives the player a suspension of disbelief between what they controlled on screen and what is actually occurring with the character. Here, each character inexplicably possesses superhuman capabilities, a shoehorned mechanic that is totally unnatural and nonsensical. Minigames are littered aplenty throughout Los Santos as well to take a respite from the chaos if one is so inclined, including gambling, tennis, golf, darts, etc. GTA V’s contributions in immersing players into its freeform world are ultimately marginal and or recycled from previous titles, but at least it still puts enough content on the player’s plate to make them hungry and curious enough to reach that desired time sink.
Then there are the series’ core mechanics that have been tweaked and altered extensively throughout its then-twelve-year period as a 3D open-world series. This section is also when the review becomes consistently contentious, as these aspects of GTA V are where the game falters considerably. I can’t believe I once thought that GTA V’s driving and shooting mechanics were a stark improvement over the previous game’s. Admittedly, GTA IV’s direction with these idiosyncratic assets of the series was a bit unyielding. Still, once I became accustomed to the game’s more realistic physics engine, I began to appreciate the intricacies of the driving mechanics and felt a profound sense of accomplishment when I drove proficiently enough that I wasn’t inadvertently ejecting Niko from the driver’s seat between every destination. On the other hand, the player is guaranteed to never face any initial complications when they step into any vehicle and rev up the engine in GTA V. The weight of realistic acceleration and vehicle momentum has been shed from the driving equation like a snake’s skin. Immediately, as the player puts their foot on the gas, it's pedal to the metal with very little in the way of rational physics inhibiting the player from safely swerving and turning despite the calamitous speeds. This applies to most if not all vehicles at the player’s disposal, ignoring variables such as the immense bulk of a fire truck or the longer, rectangular bodies of a limousine. Every single car, no matter the size, is also as durable as a cast-iron pan, so any damage received by driving recklessly is ultimately moot in the long run. It’s the farthest cry from the days of GTA III, where an abrupt shift in altitude could’ve upset a vehicle enough to burst like a ruptured appendix. As much as I groaned and griped about the fragility of GTA III’s vehicles, subsequent titles improved upon this issue to the point where it was no longer something I considered. In GTA V, the developers have overcorrected to the point of preventing the player from being inconvenienced by their lack of driving finesse. Auto shops have replaced the blunt, simple services of the series staple Pay-and-Sprays, where the player can modify and augment attributes of any car, such as speed and defense. What exactly is the incentive to visit this service when every conceivable vehicle zooms off like a rocket and can be bruised and battered with impunity like a Hot Wheels car?
The shooting in GTA V is also an indication of something that was once faulty and vexing in GTA III coming full circle to a degree of agreeability, albeit far too agreeable to the point where it becomes an issue again. The shooting of GTA has progressed from the awkward imprecision of its first 3D outing to directly targeting the desired opponent by pressing the trigger, with San Andreas and GTA IV supplying a health indicator as a nifty visual reference. GTA V decides that depicting a target’s health had become unnecessary, instead having the targeting reticle burst outward upon executing the target. It sounds like a regressive choice on all fronts, but signaling how much more firepower is required to put an enemy six feet under really is superfluous. Whereas the vehicles of GTA V are solid as steel, human beings have become a bunch of namby-pambys who can’t tolerate even a smidge of searing lead. NPCs and enemies no longer writhe around in grievous pain after being shot in a non-vital area like the arm or the leg, for any spillage of blood from any piece of anatomy is liable to be fatal. Even though aiming at any area of the body will efficiently subdue anyone pointed at, the game even course-corrects the reticle to automatically hone in on a person’s head, ensuring a critical hit just by pressing the targeting trigger. Needless to say, the immediate, effortless alternating of the two back buttons on the controller negates the satisfaction of a skilled kill. What was wrong with working one’s way up to a critical area while targeting with shaky precision in GTA IV? Every headshot I accomplished in that game felt gratifying, but here, I feel as if a condescending force is obliged to do it for me. To add to the newfound trivial nature of the series’ shooting, Ammu-Nations are no longer a necessary, continual source of ammo replenishment. Sure, the stores still exist and involve at least one mandatory look-around for one mission. However, the game automatically supplies the player with enough firepower to penetrate Fort Knox as the game progresses, with exorbitant ammunition to boot. I now know the jaded feeling of being a rich kid on Christmas, albeit with an adulthood self-awareness that knows where this disillusionment stems from. The weapon wheel that organizes each of these weapons is, however, a bona fide quality-of-life enhancement that should’ve been implemented several entries sooner.
If delving into the driving and shooting mechanics of GTA V didn’t already speak volumes on this point, I’ll say it clear as day: GTA V is stupidly facile. It’s the gaming epitome of the expression that something is so easy that a *insert a perceivably mentally deficient creature here* can do it. I’ve struggled more with brushing my teeth at times than at any point while playing GTA V. Since we’ve already discussed how the mechanics of the game have been nerfed to oblivion, we might as well throw the general punitive blowback of the police into the fire of modern GTA discourse. How do the boys in blue respond to the transgressive, anti-social acts that the player will likely be committing continually throughout the game? With relative lethargy, actually. GTA V continues the previous game’s wanted system, in which the player must avoid the blue and red circles on the radar that signify the police’s range of perception. Liberty City’s boys in blue were very vigilant in their efforts to crack down on illegal activities, so it was quite challenging to evade their militant, hawk-like gazes. On the other side of the country in Los Santos, Chief Wiggum is evidently the commissioner of LSPD operations. Zipping beyond their immediate reaches will take a few seconds, provided that the player isn’t accident-prone, and when the police lose sight of the player, the perpetrator in “hot pursuit” can simply obscure themselves in a shaded corner until they seem to concede defeat. Those who express the idiom that you can run but can't hide evidently have never committed a crime in Los Santos. The player will lose all but their equipped weapon if they’re apprehended, but having them use lethal force will instead result in spawning at a hospital, paying a $5000 fee. Considering that every character already has a substantial amount of money that only increases with progression, it’s as insignificant as paying a toll. Honestly, because the penalty for disturbing the peace is practically inconsequential, it fosters a greater sense of freedom than any other game in the series, even though it's ultimately another indictment of the game’s general emphasis on leniency. Again, I can relate to a child of the upper class, living day by day, only receiving slaps on their wrists for their poor decisions.
Naturally, the encompassing ease of GTA V complicates, or rather, uncomplicates, the array of missions that progress the game’s story. On top of lackadaisical police chases and elementary gameplay mechanics, checkpoints are littered all over in what feels like every step of the way across all missions in GTA V. Dying was not a common occurrence during my playthrough, something I thought I’d never utter when discussing a game from this franchise, so I can’t say with certainty how severely the game will punish the player for their failures. Still, whenever I did croak due to a miscalculation or lack of attentiveness, I swear that I only retraced a couple of steps upon respawning. Still, whether or not any of the missions fail to rekindle the red-faced frustration of some GTA classics, such as “Espresso 2 Go!” or “Supply Lines,” what really matters is the fun factor and diversity of the mission selection that GTA V bestows. Overall, I think that GTA V shuffles the objectives of their mission itinerary adequately enough so as not to lose the player’s interest, even though their lack of stakes ultimately bogs down their engagement. Ducking and covering will be as prominent a mechanic in GTA V’s missions as it was in the previous game, but the percentage of them has marginally decreased, probably because the onus is no longer on GTA V to showcase such a system. “Did Somebody Say Yoga?” sees Michael reluctantly humoring the activity his wife has traded for tennis, which is a rhythm-oriented sequence that trips up most players for some reason. “Monkey Business” makes wonderful utilization of the game’s diving mechanics, while planes have never been so graceful in a GTA game as when Trevor flies over the arid hills of Blaine County in “Nervous Ron.” One mission in the game that lives in infamy is “By the Book,” an interactive torture sequence where the player selects five different cruel instruments to forcibly coax information out of an FIB person of interest. The torturing itself isn’t all that involved from a gameplay perspective, but it’s still an upsettingly sadistic display nonetheless.
While GTA V doesn’t have any trouble providing diverse, high-octane missions to supplement the story’s daunting length, the prevailing issue lies in how they are paced and coordinated. For example, trying to maintain Michael’s balance with a sequence of analog directions and button presses in the aforementioned yoga mission does not end with Michael (rightfully) attempting to sucker punch the sleazy Fabian into his pool. Michael’s immediate decision to bond with his son, Jimmy, ends with a hallucinatory sequence where Michael is experiencing the effects of whatever drug his son slipped him. These two events easily could’ve been divided into separate missions, but a mission only offering yoga would’ve compromised on GTA V’s stubborn initiative to inject a constant surge of adrenaline at every waking moment in its story. Every single mission in GTA V is completely apeshit in one way or another, involving destruction on a scale that rivals the climaxes of every thrilling action film ever created. No matter the point in the story where the mission takes place, bedlam equivalent to the Bay of Pigs will commence. Michael will publicly kick the shit out of series stalwart Lazlo on live television, then go on a covert mission for the FIB to find a body in a morgue that cannot be conducted quietly, and then scale down a skyscraper trying to kidnap someone in broad daylight while Trevor is flying a helicopter overhead. Each of these missions are romps most riotous, but the overstimulation of excessive action leaves me numb to most of them. At the same time, the few exceptions that involve hauling crates at the docks and monitoring the travel of a car from a helicopter are definitely among the most boring missions in the series.
Really, this kind of conspicuously grandiose mission should be reserved for the heists, a prominent mission type in GTA V that does signal a milestone in the game’s story. These intricately planned missions, often constructed by Michael’s old friend, the pudgy, crippled, conspiracy-conscious Lester, where he’ll devise an intricate schematic that is malleable enough to pursue the heist from different approaches. Preparation for the heist, such as hiring additional manpower and procuring a getaway vehicle, also elevates their significance over the average illegal escapade. Forgetting the fact that dying during a heist after meticulous plotting is inconsequential, the act of storming the establishment or sneaking through it always exudes a thrill that is more deserved than the typical mission, plus accomplishing it always pays off with exorbitant dividends. Still, the heists are most emblematic of the problem that persists with most missions in GTA V: the scale of chaos committed is too large to ignore. For most GTA missions, no matter how the body count stacks up, they tend to still be contained to those involved in the criminal underworld and a select squadron of cops assigned to deal with them. With these characters constantly committing crimes of the century, targeting public places and highly secured businesses, you’d think someone would notice a pattern and they’d garner a reputation. Hell, the news of each heist is broadcast on every radio station, yet no one can surmise any suspects. Packy McReary can be selected as a supporting figure for the late-game heists, and he’ll boast about the bank vault score he partook in back in GTA IV. That heist had stakes, its difficulty matched its magnitude, and it was the only mission of its caliber that consequently changed the course of the game for its remaining duration. When the characters can just rob several secured businesses willy-nilly, it dilutes the impact of what a heist should have by proxy.
Criticizing the outlying context of GTA V’s heist missions is just one of several missteps in GTA V’s overall story, and divulging the extent of the game’s total number of holes is enough to trigger a sense of narrative trypophobia. A great deal of the story’s shortcomings stems from the spectacularly flawed trio of protagonists, and I don’t just mean from a moral standpoint. Let’s start with Michael, since his arc starts earlier than the rest of them. Because he’s still rife with depression, anxiety, and deep-seated anger issues despite his life of luxury, the Tony Soprano parallels are clear as a windex. Is it really fair to compare Michael to television's most complex character it's ever conceived? Considering that Michael is from the same series that birthed Niko, the most complex character in gaming, I believe that Rockstar is completely capable of crafting a protagonist with exquisite layers. Michael, however, missed the mark. Beneath the machismo demeanor and intimidating job title, Tony Soprano exuded plenty of other personality traits that subverted someone of his stature. He could be genuinely funny, sweet, and sensitive, almost making us believe that he could’ve been a productive member of society if he had been born under different circumstances. Michael, on the other hand, only expresses the unsavory surface traits of anger and self-loathing, without the moments of charm that made Tony likable. The nuclear family dynamic that provided more insight into Tony’s character is equally present with Michael, but every member of the Townley/De Santa clan is fucking horrid. His wife Amanda has shamelessly banged every other male NPC in Los Santos, his son Jimmy is a spoiled bum that manages to be less sympathetic than AJ, and Tracey is the bimboification of the one Sopranos family member who subversively didn’t fall into the obvious trappings of a teenage daughter character. Whenever Michael confronts each of them for their individual problematic behaviors, all they do is deflect it by reminding Michael that he’s also a bad person, a glass houses scenario if there ever was one. Still, they might be onto something, considering that there is no logical explanation for why Michael does what he does. Unlike Tony Soprano, who was trapped into leading a life of crime, Michael’s life decision of being a career criminal stems from an unknown origin. It’s matter-of-factly what he does to support himself financially, no more, no less. Because Michael is relatively one-dimensional, he falls a little behind Tommy Vercetti in the rankings of GTA protagonists, only because the man from Vice City was unashamed of his lifestyle.
Once Michael makes his criminal comeback and slips up by quoting a film to a witness that only he would be fond of, it introduces the character that was THE talking point among all the gamers at my high school. Trevor Phillips is, by far, the most rousing component to GTA V’s story and perhaps the entire game. During the first cutscene where he’s the primary character, he curb stomps Johnny Klebitz from GTA IV to a bloody pulp for confronting his adulterous rogering of Ashley, then proceeds to oust all the surviving members of the Lost. I knew that girl would be the death of him. Then, alongside the paranoid Ron and simpleton Wade, Trevor then embarks on a streak of endeavors ranging from wiping out an entire family of rival meth cooks to blowing up an entire trailer park. Don’t get me started on the atrocities he commits towards Wade’s cousin Floyd and a teddy bear named Mr. Raspberry Jam once he arrives in Los Santos. All of these missions in the desert are intended to frame Trevor as a man who should not be trifled with. He’s the embodiment of an untethered ID under the influence of methamphetamines, a flesh and blood boogeyman that presents the pinnacle example of why parents tell their children to never converse with strangers. Hell, he supports the argument that adults should follow the same advice. He’s incredibly entertaining but alas, he’s equally as one-dimensional as Michael. However, the developers evidently made an effort for the player to think otherwise. A character of Trevor’s persuasion (Frank Booth from Blue Velvet comes to mind) is usually reserved for an antagonist role as a formidable force of malevolent unpredictability. When this type of character is given as much screen time as Trevor, there needs to be a considerable fleshing out of his traits so they can comfortably fit a protagonist role. We’re meant to believe that Trevor has a soft, sensitive side to him, exhibited most prominently when he kidnaps the abused spouse of cartel kingpin, Martin Madrazzo. He treats this elderly woman with uncharacteristic care and affection, but it doesn’t really expose any sort of vulnerability. Because Trevor is defined by his intense unpredictability, this impulsive, scatterbrained action is still evocative of his dominant surface-level trait. Mommy issues might be a subject of discussion but if this were true, why doesn’t he treat Amanda or Franklin’s aunt with the same selective respect? Tony Soprano never discriminated against a select few animals! Because Trevor is nothing but a turbulent source of uncomfortable comedy, I approach him with a grain of salt.
Last, and certainly the least of the three playable protagonists, is Franklin. One might wonder why I’ve chosen to discuss him last, considering Trevor is formally introduced far later in the game, but Franklin truly is the least impactful protagonist. This twenty-something African-American who resides in the 21st-century version of CJ’s old stomping grounds is unsatisfied with his meager life, living with his aunt and collaborating with Lamar, his obnoxious, dim-witted childhood friend. When Franklin meets Michael after he repossesses his son’s car, Franklin eagerly takes the opportunity to put himself under Michael’s tutelage for the subsequent string of heists. Once Trevor is back in the picture, Franklin’s relevance in the story takes a complete nosedive. He’s relegated to being the outlying middle man between the butting heads of Michael and Trevor, but this only works if Franklin were the sole protagonist acting as a nondescript avatar like Claude. The missions assigned to Franklin by Lester are completely removed from the overarching story, shoehorned in to remind the player that Franklin (and Lester, really) are still active characters in this story. Nothing like a protagonist operating from the sidelines to show how insignificant he is, eh? Franklin’s arc essentially culminates in Lester housing him in an expensive, extravagant house in the hills, a shoehorned, sudden event that happens at an anticlimactic midpoint in the game. Hooray? Franklin’s inclusion is either the developers refusing to stray away from the hood environment that defined the conceptual backbone of San Andreas, or that GTA V had to have three playable characters because GTA IV did, like a younger sibling who whines that his older sibling’s piece of cake is bigger and therefore demands to have the same amount. Neither reason justifies the existence of Franklin, who is undoubtedly the series’ weakest protagonist.
Franklin’s role as the neutral mediator between the two actual driving forces of the narrative starts to actually hold some weight when all of their actions eventually culminate in shit hitting the fan (sort of). Suddenly, corrupt FIB agent and massive douchebag, Steve Haines, urgently requests that Franklin whack Trevor because he’s stirred up more shit than a witch’s cauldron. Alternately, billionaire magnate and fellow douchebag, Devin Weston, makes the same demand to Franklin, but to kill Michael instead, as revenge for him sabotaging a real estate deal. The last mission of the game sees Franklin ousting one of them, a choice the player has to make that will result in the decided target permanently being locked from playing as in that save file. Are they serious? In what timeline in any multiple universes would Franklin ever consider killing Michael over Trevor? Franklin and Michael are genuine friends, albeit if their relationship was formulated overnight for the sake of narrative convenience, and working with Michael has been the perfect avenue for Franklin to accomplish his long-term goals. Some have stated that Michael is manipulating Franklin to live a life of crime under his wing, but Franklin doesn’t seem to have any reservations about how he earns a living. Meanwhile, Franklin only sees Trevor as a source of comic relief at best and a terrifying nutcase at worst. Plus, Trevor has kicked far more beehives than Michael, so plenty more people will be appeased if the drug-addled spitfire is dealt with. The player also has a third option to defy all of the threats at hand alongside Michael and Trevor, which will result in all three characters surviving the end of the story unscathed. On second thought, this is the only ending that makes sense from the player’s perspective. Why would the player ever want to sacrifice a playable character and remove all of their individual content? The “Deathwish” mission is misleading, as it isn’t a risk in the slightest. I’d comment that there is no feasible way to kill two men of prestige as they do, but they’ve proven that there are no ramifications for their actions with every event leading up to this.
How does one make GTA V’s ending make sense? Simple, firmly establish Trevor as the game’s antagonist. I’m not saying he can’t be playable, but the game has to relinquish him at some point, and the game even provides just the occasion. Michael isn’t so much afraid of Trevor as a fellow human being and crime compadre; rather, he’s afraid that he’ll dig through Michael’s dirty secrets from a decade prior and strike oil at the full extent of the awful truth. I guess one surprising trait Trevor exhibits is that he’s a bit of a sentimentalist, pining for the days with his old crew intact, including Brad. We know that Brad is dead, but Trevor believes he’s simply incarcerated. Once Michael and Lester make too many deflections on Trevor’s plans to break Brad out of his supposed cell, a lightbulb shines over Trevor’s head that takes him back to North Yankton. Michael follows him to adulterate the evidence, but Trevor soon finds that Brad is rotting in a coffin in Michael’s place. How does this unhinged maniac respond to the extent of Michael’s deception? He avoids Michael for a few days and then harps on it in a pouty, passive-aggressive manner like a scorned spouse. Really, Rockstar? Seeing Trevor respond like this, knowing his penchant for depravity and vehement rage, is fucking pathetic. This should’ve been the point where Trevor becomes the sharpest thorn in Michael’s side, and killing him should be more of a no-brainer.
Grand Theft Auto V reminds me of something insightful, albeit cynical, that a high school teacher of mine once said about the alcohol industry. You see, Coors Light, one of the biggest beer brands in the world, has a gimmick where its cans turn blue once they are cold and therefore, sufficient to drink. As a fifty-something man who had been drinking legally for decades, he pointed out that he doesn’t need a visual aid to know when his beer is cold. What he alluded to is that this gimmick would only impress a demographic too young to legally consume its product, namely, the kids he was speaking to. Alcohol corporations would be overjoyed if children could indulge in their wares to maximize profit, separating law and business like church and state. Children are also not supposed to be playing Grand Theft Auto, but this doesn’t mean that they aren’t designing their games to cater towards this lucrative demographic, regardless. This is why I believe GTA V is as undemanding and streamlined as it is, to placate their impressionable, secret customer base. As an adult, I did admittedly still have fun playing it, but everything from the effortless ease of the mechanics to the slapdash story resulted in a flaccid, impotent experience. Then again, GTA V has become the second best-selling game of all time as of writing this, so what the fuck do I know? I’d like to point out that R-rated movies rarely ever break sales records like these, by the way. It’s about time that an heir appears to knock GTA V off its pedestal and end this unethical, extortionate cash flow. Still, I fear that Rockstar’s successful business model will just produce a new product that will commit the same sins all over again.
