Where Rockstar Went... Wrong?
I'm aware that the whole world has gone Grand Theft Auto IV crazy, but just wanted to make sure everyone found this David Kushner-written piece for Wired on 'The Road to Ruin: How Grand Theft Auto Hit the Skids'.
It's been referred in a couple of places (such as Planet Grand Theft Auto) that the article is a 'hit piece' against the company. And while I don't think that's entirely true, I didn't find this piece very satisfying - despite the smart guys who helped put it together. The reason? Rockstar's insane levels of secrecy. The only interviews with the co-founders are from 2002-ish, and I would say that Wired were pretty unsuccessful at finding anyone with any insight into the inner workings of the company.
Obviously, with Take-Two getting taken over by activist shareholders this week, the entire future of Rockstar as a division could be in the balance. But with the insane amount of hype around GTA IV, can anyone afford to mess with the Housers?
[And what - no mention of David Jones in the piece? For me, though he left before the height of the franchise, he's just as key to Rockstar's success by perfecting the initial GTA gameplay, to go alongside the Housers' keenly refined (and sometimes slightly 'overcrafted', for me) sense of brand and style.]
Comments
I agree - the lack of credit to Jones is a real disservice. The Housers can pat their backs about the purportedly edgy dialogue and embarrassingly juvenile smut humor of the series (OMG LOL @ "The Glory Hole"! You brash and sophisticated funsters!) but it's the gameplay and freedom that sell most people on GTA, not the writing.
Posted by: parish | March 31, 2007 6:19 PM
Seconded, about GTA's freedom. Bully seems to have gotten huge critical acclaim for being GTA without the questionable content.
Ah, the days of DMA Design [http://dmadesign.org/]. Sometimes I feel like the only guy in the world who remembers Uniracers.
Posted by: John H. | April 1, 2007 1:10 AM
Parish: The first GTA was absolutely filled with juvenile smut humor...
Posted by: fluffy bunny | April 1, 2007 2:28 AM
I demand Uniracers 3D (maybe Uniracers HD, or whatever a reincarnation would be called)!
Posted by: Matthew | April 1, 2007 2:49 AM
Hey Simon, how about a GTAIV postmortem for GD? Maybe if you start working on Rockstar North now you'll get an okay by October. I'd love to see what's going on there.
Posted by: mister slim | April 1, 2007 5:42 PM
"What went wrong #3:
Gave everybody desks made of Krugerrands to celebrate release of teaser trailer. This led the team not to fully appreciate the Faberge Egg skeet shooting competition awarded to the winners of the office chair race."
Posted by: packratshow | April 1, 2007 6:47 PM
You may note that the new T2 CEO is the former CEO of BMG entertainment, where the Housers worked before being bought by T2 and getting turned into Rockstar. So I don't think that Rockstar has any chance of getting axed, necessarily, in the near future ;-)
Posted by: Rahul | April 2, 2007 1:14 AM
In my opinion, the equity of the Rockstar brand and its associated IP is far too valuable to warrant the guillotine.
Posted by: Morgan Ramsay | April 3, 2007 4:33 AM