Rockstar Games and American History

Abstract

List of figures i List of abbreviations vIntroduction: The American History of Rockstar Games Historical Games Studies and the 'developer-historian' Rationale Methodology Thesis Overview Chapter 0.5: Game Overviews Red Dead Redemption (2010) L.A. Noire (2011) Chapter 1: The Rockstar Brand Open World Games Rockstar as Outsider Rockstar (g)ames as Satire; Rockstar as Cultural Historian Rockstar and American Cinema Masculinity 'Rockstar Games Presents…' Conclusions Chapter 2: Creating a Discourse of Historical Authenticity The 'True West' and 'Real Crimes' L.A. Noire's 'Real Crime Stories' Conclusions: The Historiographic Surround and the Rockstar Brand Chapter 3: Creating a Discourse of Cinematic Authenticity A discourse of cinematic authenticity 'Rockstar Recommends' Red Dead Redemption and the Western L.A. Noire and the (Neo) Noir History of Los Angeles Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and the 1980s according to Rockstar Conclusions Chapter 4. The Predetermined Limits of Historical Gameplay Red Dead Redemption: The 'complete western experience'? Authenticating the 'Open-World' Western Experience Gameplay: 'This is what life in the West was like. This is Red Dead Redemption.' L.A. Noire: 'a new genre of video games' 'Sometimes there's no better substitute than real life': the 'Real' Space of 1947 Los Angeles Marketing 'Authentic' Detective Work Selling Freedom and the Illusion of Choice Conclusions Chapter 5. Women in Rockstar's History Revolver to Redemption Women in RDR's 'True West' 'A man's world' Making Fun of Masculinity? L.A. Noire The noir 'zeitgeist', film criticism and historiography The Black Dahlia and the 'Homicide' cases: A 'sad story' of post-war womanhood The Femme Fatale Conclusions Conclusion: 'Rockstar Games Presents'…American History?The case for studying historical video game promotion Bibliography i Thank you to my supervisor, Professor J.E. Smyth. Your knowledge and guidance have been invaluable in navigating the PhD experience, and I am so grateful for your endless encouragement and belief in me. To my family, and especially my parents, who have always supported my academic endeavours. Thank you for being there to remind me that there was and is life outside of them. Thank you to all the people who were there to support or humour me, even when I was in the pits of PhD despair, especially Somak

Video games, historical representation and soft power

“…Although the games industry has made a range of attempts to consolidate the value of these games as history in themselves -including arguments about their 'authenticity' or 'accuracy' (e.g. Burgess and Jones 2021; Donald and Reid forthcoming) -they have also been supplemented with out-of-game content which presents historical discourse in a more recognisable manner (Wright 2022). The employment of paratextual material such as trailers and supporting websites to communicate historical information bears on our discussion here, as it removes regulatory risk from the game itself and places it into spaces which are more readily modified for, or overlooked by, censors.…”

Animating a Plausible Past: Perceived Realism and Sense of Place Influence Entertainment of and Tourism Intentions From Historical Video Games

“…Historical video games employing a realist simulation style (Chapman, 2016) often directly represent or simulate historical periods and/or locations in which players take the role of a person (real or fictitious) from that period (as opposed to games like Civilization, which use a conceptual simulation style in which historical systems and processes are simulated, rather than a specific location or period). As such, social realism is central to these games, as the (perceived) fidelity of the in-game world with the real historical world is often one of the main draws of these games (Wright, 2022). Here, social realism can also be understood as the degree to which the simulation of history is perceived to resemble a historical reality-regardless of the accuracy of that portrayal.…”

Playing with cowboys, outlaws, and spacefarers: The remediated American Frontier in video games

“…Wright (2022) analyzes the essential role that claims about authenticity play in the design and promotion of Rockstar games. She focuses primarily on the efforts made by Rockstar to communicate that the Red Dead Redemption series and L.A. Noire (Team Bondi, 2011)—an action‐adventure game set in the late 1940s with a detective film‐noir‐like plot—are historically accurate and authentic, a claim that, allows Rockstar to present itself as a warden/historian of the past and a producer of factual knowledge.…”

“…The game's connection with the Western is made even more visible via the cinematic view, an optional form of horse riding where, after selecting a destination in the map or during some missions, the horse Arthur rides moves automatically, the action is shown from angles that are not used during regular gameplay, and black bars at the top and bottom of the screen appear, simulating a wide-screen ratio and the feelings of watching, and not just playing, a traditional, authentic Western. Wright (2022) analyzes the essential role that claims about authenticity play in the design and promotion of Rockstar games. She focuses primarily on the efforts made by Rockstar to communicate that the Red Dead Redemption series and L.A. Noire (Team Bondi, 2011)an action-adventure game set in the late 1940s with a detective film-noir-like plot-are historically accurate and authentic, a claim that, allows Rockstar to present itself as a warden/historian of the past and a producer of factual knowledge.…”