Architectures of deviation: exploring the spatial protocols of contemporary videogames

摘要

On 18 November 2014, a new version of a city already visited by over 34 million people was introduced to the world.1 This is the digitised metropolis of 'Los Santos', a facsimile version of Los Angeles that provides the backdrop for the videogame 'Grand Theft Auto V ('GTA V'). The city is expanded, increasingly defined, and with more urban life when compared to its previous iterations. This arises through the rebuilding of a now two-year-old game for the 'latest gen' consoles, the Xbox One and PlayStation _4 (PS_4). While the city of Los Santos creeps ever closer to an exacting visual verisimilitude of reality, its physics remain improbable and its logics cartoonish. As a videogame world, it must twist and warp the real, making it pliable in order to allow its spaces to be negotiated through an encapsulated set of rules that underpin the game. So while a cursory glance at what appears on screen may be startling in its resemblance to Los Angeles, the properties of objects, buildings, and tertiary information are all afforded symbolic meaning that diverges from reality. Game theorist Espen Aarseth argues that for all of their increasing realism, videogames are ultimately 'allegories of space' that 'rely on their deviation from reality in order to make the illusion playable'.