i was like 5 years old when i first heard Californication. it made me bug my parents for years to get guitar lessons just to learn how to play it. i kinda did! i recorded a scuffed version of the Can't Stop video with my brother (and a camcorder). the Californication video, at least nowadays, represents to me an idealization of video game aesthetics in a musical dreamscape. music videos of this era tend to be very surreal; the fake game the band was in was just an expression of that trend, but it still easily captured my mind.
the video does not represent a videogame that makes sense. at all. it breaks free from any mechanics and the sense of player input because it's CGI, and it was made with that in mind - not with the intent to create a simulacrum of a videogame. it made me, as a child, go insane about how this music video would work as a real game. even when i was a little kid, it didn't make any sense at all! but it was one of the main things that made me think about how i see games.
yunno, i thought about how those very contextually sensitive animations playing while Flea dodges and jumps around LA people wouldn't make sense in a game played with a controller. "not even GTA can do this!", i thought. that's what made it so dreamlike - the MV emulates videogame aesthetic and UI with graphics that didn't make sense in any console at the time and completely incoherent "gameplay". it's how it feels to dream that you're inside a game.
transforming this into even a slightly playable game, as neat as it is, can't evoke the same feelings that the MV does. the detailed minimap, slightly freeform sections, and the lack of the LA cityscape and iconography make this game too "real". it can't exist. it's based on something that is remarkable specifically because it doesn't exist.
but like, this is still good though. cool effort! just made me think a bit.
the video does not represent a videogame that makes sense. at all. it breaks free from any mechanics and the sense of player input because it's CGI, and it was made with that in mind - not with the intent to create a simulacrum of a videogame. it made me, as a child, go insane about how this music video would work as a real game. even when i was a little kid, it didn't make any sense at all! but it was one of the main things that made me think about how i see games.
yunno, i thought about how those very contextually sensitive animations playing while Flea dodges and jumps around LA people wouldn't make sense in a game played with a controller. "not even GTA can do this!", i thought. that's what made it so dreamlike - the MV emulates videogame aesthetic and UI with graphics that didn't make sense in any console at the time and completely incoherent "gameplay". it's how it feels to dream that you're inside a game.
transforming this into even a slightly playable game, as neat as it is, can't evoke the same feelings that the MV does. the detailed minimap, slightly freeform sections, and the lack of the LA cityscape and iconography make this game too "real". it can't exist. it's based on something that is remarkable specifically because it doesn't exist.
but like, this is still good though. cool effort! just made me think a bit.