1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,320 Most 3D, character-driven video games 2 00:00:03,320 --> 00:00:06,240 can be pretty easily placed into one of two categories: 3 00:00:06,240 --> 00:00:08,890 either first person or third person. 4 00:00:08,890 --> 00:00:10,550 In a first-person game, you see the game world 5 00:00:10,550 --> 00:00:12,560 through the actual eyes of the player character 6 00:00:12,560 --> 00:00:13,950 as though you were that character, 7 00:00:13,950 --> 00:00:16,120 and in a third-person game, you see the player character 8 00:00:16,120 --> 00:00:18,310 from the outside - often from behind their back 9 00:00:18,310 --> 00:00:20,680 or from a fixed isometric perspective. 10 00:00:20,680 --> 00:00:22,280 But the existence of these two perspectives 11 00:00:22,280 --> 00:00:23,360 begs a question: 12 00:00:23,360 --> 00:00:25,520 if this is what a first-person game looks like, 13 00:00:25,520 --> 00:00:28,600 and this is what a third-person video game looks like... 14 00:00:28,600 --> 00:00:32,480 what exactly would second-person look like? 15 00:00:32,480 --> 00:00:34,670 Now, I'm not the first person to wonder about this - 16 00:00:34,670 --> 00:00:35,890 the question of whether or not 17 00:00:35,890 --> 00:00:38,140 a second-person shooter could actually exist 18 00:00:38,140 --> 00:00:40,280 is one that has plagued video game message boards 19 00:00:40,280 --> 00:00:42,560 just about as long as the Internet has existed. 20 00:00:42,560 --> 00:00:43,880 It's also served as the premise 21 00:00:43,880 --> 00:00:45,950 for some pretty good comedy sketches over the years, 22 00:00:45,950 --> 00:00:47,740 like this one from Mega64: 23 00:00:47,740 --> 00:00:48,680 - [Announcer] Introducing the world's 24 00:00:48,680 --> 00:00:50,973 first second-person shooter. 25 00:00:50,973 --> 00:00:53,890 (video game music) 26 00:00:54,824 --> 00:00:56,710 (rock music) - No no no no! 27 00:00:56,710 --> 00:00:57,860 - And this one from The Onion. 28 00:00:57,860 --> 00:00:59,600 - To enter second-person shooter mode, 29 00:00:59,600 --> 00:01:01,730 you just simply adjust the narrative slider 30 00:01:01,730 --> 00:01:02,863 from first to second. 31 00:01:03,800 --> 00:01:06,650 - You are walking down a long corridor. 32 00:01:06,650 --> 00:01:10,140 Suddenly, a Nazi leaps out from around the doorway 33 00:01:10,140 --> 00:01:13,980 and unleashes a hail of machine gun fire in your direction. 34 00:01:13,980 --> 00:01:15,080 - But to help us actually figure out 35 00:01:15,080 --> 00:01:16,670 what a second-person game would really be, 36 00:01:16,670 --> 00:01:19,440 I think it would be helpful to look at this grammatically. 37 00:01:19,440 --> 00:01:21,660 In written language, the term "first person" 38 00:01:21,660 --> 00:01:23,320 denotes any writing where the point of view 39 00:01:23,320 --> 00:01:25,380 uses phrases like "I" or m"y" 40 00:01:25,380 --> 00:01:28,250 to tell the story from the perspective of the protagonist. 41 00:01:28,250 --> 00:01:29,440 Third-person writing, on the other hand, 42 00:01:29,440 --> 00:01:30,900 uses third-person pronouns - 43 00:01:30,900 --> 00:01:34,280 for example, "he went this way," "she went that way," et cetera - 44 00:01:34,280 --> 00:01:37,000 to talk about characters from an outside perspective. 45 00:01:37,000 --> 00:01:38,760 Now, second-person writing does exist, 46 00:01:38,760 --> 00:01:39,920 but it's kind of a weird one - 47 00:01:39,920 --> 00:01:43,360 in second person, the primary pronoun used is "you." 48 00:01:43,360 --> 00:01:45,800 "You do this," "you go there," et cetera. 49 00:01:45,800 --> 00:01:48,330 The second person is actually a lot less common 50 00:01:48,330 --> 00:01:49,351 in narrative writing, 51 00:01:49,351 --> 00:01:50,940 and it's actually something you're more likely to encounter 52 00:01:50,940 --> 00:01:52,890 in, say, a list of instructions 53 00:01:52,890 --> 00:01:55,170 or a choose-your-own-adventure book. 54 00:01:55,170 --> 00:01:57,230 Now, the analogous video game camera perspectives 55 00:01:57,230 --> 00:01:59,490 for first and third-person writing are obvious - 56 00:01:59,490 --> 00:02:01,280 but what about for second-person? 57 00:02:01,280 --> 00:02:02,760 We know what an "I" game looks like 58 00:02:02,760 --> 00:02:04,410 and we know what a "he" game looks like, 59 00:02:04,410 --> 00:02:06,450 but what about a "you" game? 60 00:02:06,450 --> 00:02:08,690 Strangely enough, I actually found the answer to this 61 00:02:08,690 --> 00:02:10,370 before I even came up with the question, 62 00:02:10,370 --> 00:02:12,810 and, believe it or not, it came to me courtesy of a game 63 00:02:12,810 --> 00:02:14,810 you may have heard me talk about once before - 64 00:02:14,810 --> 00:02:16,840 and that game is Driver: San Francisco. 65 00:02:16,840 --> 00:02:18,110 See, for all the interesting missions 66 00:02:18,110 --> 00:02:20,170 in Driver: San Francisco - and there are plenty of them - 67 00:02:20,170 --> 00:02:21,410 there's one mission in particular 68 00:02:21,410 --> 00:02:23,670 that I swear to God I think about all the time. 69 00:02:23,670 --> 00:02:25,440 The mission in question is called "The Target" 70 00:02:25,440 --> 00:02:28,430 and it's the final mission of chapter six of the game. 71 00:02:28,430 --> 00:02:30,670 In the game, you play as a cop named John Tanner 72 00:02:30,670 --> 00:02:32,670 who, for reasons I won't get into here, 73 00:02:32,670 --> 00:02:34,340 basically has a superpower that allows you 74 00:02:34,340 --> 00:02:36,350 to take over the bodies of any other driver, 75 00:02:36,350 --> 00:02:38,260 and has begun using that superpower 76 00:02:38,260 --> 00:02:39,900 to foil a possible terror plot 77 00:02:39,900 --> 00:02:41,570 from a gangster named Jericho. 78 00:02:41,570 --> 00:02:43,060 Over the course of the game Tanner decides 79 00:02:43,060 --> 00:02:44,660 that the best way to unravel Jericho's plans 80 00:02:44,660 --> 00:02:45,800 is to do it from the inside, 81 00:02:45,800 --> 00:02:48,310 and in order to do that, Tanner takes over the body 82 00:02:48,310 --> 00:02:50,260 of a low-level henchman named Ordell 83 00:02:50,260 --> 00:02:51,420 and uses his driving skills 84 00:02:51,420 --> 00:02:53,300 to help move Ordell up the ranks. 85 00:02:53,300 --> 00:02:54,850 The final mission in this story arc 86 00:02:54,850 --> 00:02:57,360 sees you inhabiting Ordell's body one last time 87 00:02:57,360 --> 00:03:00,020 to complete a major assignment from his boss Leila, 88 00:03:00,020 --> 00:03:01,490 who is this international assassin 89 00:03:01,490 --> 00:03:03,240 and Jericho's second-in-command. 90 00:03:03,240 --> 00:03:04,320 Tanner's plan? 91 00:03:04,320 --> 00:03:07,130 Warp into Ordell's body and, without arousing suspicion, 92 00:03:07,130 --> 00:03:10,460 drive Leila and Ordell directly into police custody. 93 00:03:10,460 --> 00:03:11,710 Now, the mission begins as normal 94 00:03:11,710 --> 00:03:13,330 with Tanner and his partner Jones 95 00:03:13,330 --> 00:03:15,800 driving their iconic orange Dodge Challenger, 96 00:03:15,800 --> 00:03:17,720 and soon enough, you warp into Ordell's body 97 00:03:17,720 --> 00:03:19,110 with Leila in the passenger seat 98 00:03:19,110 --> 00:03:21,337 where she gives you some clarity on the mission. 99 00:03:21,337 --> 00:03:22,573 (car engine roaring) 100 00:03:22,573 --> 00:03:24,770 - [Leila] Ordell, I need nothing but your best today. 101 00:03:24,770 --> 00:03:25,760 - [Tanner] What's going down? 102 00:03:25,760 --> 00:03:27,870 - [Leila] Jericho's got a problem he wants fixed. 103 00:03:27,870 --> 00:03:29,770 Get me to the target and I'll fix it. 104 00:03:29,770 --> 00:03:31,010 - So you drive to the destination 105 00:03:31,010 --> 00:03:32,560 she's given you, closing in on your target, 106 00:03:32,560 --> 00:03:35,341 and as you get close, this happens: 107 00:03:35,341 --> 00:03:38,424 (car engine roaring) 108 00:03:39,820 --> 00:03:40,910 - Slow down. 109 00:03:40,910 --> 00:03:43,505 We should acquire the target any time now. 110 00:03:43,505 --> 00:03:48,505 (car engine roaring) (tires screeching) 111 00:03:49,070 --> 00:03:51,020 The yellow Dodge, up ahead. 112 00:03:51,020 --> 00:03:53,460 Stay close but don't be obvious. 113 00:03:53,460 --> 00:03:54,420 - ...that's my car. 114 00:03:54,420 --> 00:03:55,717 - What? 115 00:03:55,717 --> 00:03:57,500 That's the cop that's been getting in our way. 116 00:03:57,500 --> 00:03:59,380 - Do we follow him to the target? 117 00:03:59,380 --> 00:04:01,070 - ...he IS the target. 118 00:04:01,070 --> 00:04:02,280 - [Narrator] It's you. 119 00:04:02,280 --> 00:04:04,946 You've been assigned to kill... you. 120 00:04:04,946 --> 00:04:07,440 (music) 121 00:04:07,440 --> 00:04:08,580 Now, after that cutscene ends, 122 00:04:08,580 --> 00:04:10,790 you are back in Ordell's body in the first person 123 00:04:10,790 --> 00:04:12,570 with Leila sitting to your right. 124 00:04:12,570 --> 00:04:16,260 But then... you press the throttle to accelerate, 125 00:04:16,260 --> 00:04:18,440 and the car in front of you moves. 126 00:04:18,440 --> 00:04:19,680 You steer to the left and to the right... 127 00:04:19,680 --> 00:04:20,700 and the car in front of you moves 128 00:04:20,700 --> 00:04:21,690 to the left and then to the right. 129 00:04:21,690 --> 00:04:25,320 And then, quickly, it sinks in that the car you're controlling 130 00:04:25,320 --> 00:04:27,860 is actually the car you're following. 131 00:04:27,860 --> 00:04:31,250 Your perspective as the player is entirely separate 132 00:04:31,250 --> 00:04:33,680 from what you're controlling as the player. 133 00:04:33,680 --> 00:04:36,930 In other words, you're pursuing... you. 134 00:04:36,930 --> 00:04:38,650 Now, as you can see, the car that you're sitting in 135 00:04:38,650 --> 00:04:40,410 is moving, too - but, crucially, 136 00:04:40,410 --> 00:04:42,740 you're not the one who's controlling that car. 137 00:04:42,740 --> 00:04:45,010 The car you're sitting in is moving automatically, 138 00:04:45,010 --> 00:04:47,500 seemingly operated by an AI-controlled driver 139 00:04:47,500 --> 00:04:50,240 who's tailing the car you're actually controlling. 140 00:04:50,240 --> 00:04:53,160 It's basically like a chase mission in any other video game 141 00:04:53,160 --> 00:04:54,660 just like you've seen countless other times - 142 00:04:54,660 --> 00:04:56,770 except for this time, it's flipped on its head. 143 00:04:56,770 --> 00:04:58,950 This time, you're the one being followed, 144 00:04:58,950 --> 00:05:01,220 while simultaneously seeing it all unfold 145 00:05:01,220 --> 00:05:03,940 from the perspective of the car doing the following. 146 00:05:03,940 --> 00:05:04,870 And while it's hard for me to guess 147 00:05:04,870 --> 00:05:06,470 how well this comes across on video, 148 00:05:06,470 --> 00:05:08,300 all these elements combine to make something 149 00:05:08,300 --> 00:05:10,720 that is very, very odd to play. 150 00:05:10,720 --> 00:05:12,350 There's something shocking and disorienting 151 00:05:12,350 --> 00:05:15,300 about seeing a first-person perspective on your screen 152 00:05:15,300 --> 00:05:17,260 but also not controlling that perspective 153 00:05:17,260 --> 00:05:20,140 while remotely operating the car that you're tailing. 154 00:05:20,140 --> 00:05:21,940 It's the closest a video game has ever gotten 155 00:05:21,940 --> 00:05:24,060 to feeling like a true out-of-body experience, 156 00:05:24,060 --> 00:05:25,910 and it's an experience that has stuck with me 157 00:05:25,910 --> 00:05:27,900 ever since I first played this game back in 2011. 158 00:05:28,380 --> 00:05:30,120 Now, when I first played Driver: San Francisco 159 00:05:30,120 --> 00:05:30,953 eight years ago, 160 00:05:30,953 --> 00:05:32,470 I kinda just played through this mission once, 161 00:05:32,470 --> 00:05:34,990 start to finish, marveling at the unique perspective 162 00:05:34,990 --> 00:05:35,830 that this mission granted you, 163 00:05:35,830 --> 00:05:37,500 but then moving on to the rest of the game. 164 00:05:37,500 --> 00:05:39,670 But I've always felt like if I ever came back to this game, 165 00:05:39,670 --> 00:05:41,140 I'd wanna pick this mission apart 166 00:05:41,140 --> 00:05:42,260 and see what makes it tick, 167 00:05:42,260 --> 00:05:43,730 and that's part of what I hope to accomplish 168 00:05:43,730 --> 00:05:44,563 with this video. 169 00:05:44,563 --> 00:05:47,600 See, as cool as this mission is, it's also pretty linear. 170 00:05:47,600 --> 00:05:48,960 The whole thing takes place with you driving down 171 00:05:48,960 --> 00:05:51,060 this completely locked-down race course 172 00:05:51,060 --> 00:05:52,600 with no exits or detours - 173 00:05:52,600 --> 00:05:54,800 pretty much just a straight shot to the exit. 174 00:05:54,800 --> 00:05:56,840 I've always assumed that the developer Reflections 175 00:05:56,840 --> 00:05:57,930 designed this mission this way 176 00:05:57,930 --> 00:05:59,610 due to the technological limitations 177 00:05:59,610 --> 00:06:01,130 of this weird second-person camera 178 00:06:01,130 --> 00:06:02,870 that they built just for this mission. 179 00:06:02,870 --> 00:06:04,710 Perhaps there was no way for them to get this camera 180 00:06:04,710 --> 00:06:06,540 to behave properly in the actual open world 181 00:06:06,540 --> 00:06:08,270 with all the various streets, elevations, 182 00:06:08,270 --> 00:06:09,720 and alleyways you could dip into - 183 00:06:09,720 --> 00:06:11,140 not to mention the other street traffic. 184 00:06:11,140 --> 00:06:13,320 And on top of that, they built this mission 185 00:06:13,320 --> 00:06:15,070 with a pretty strict countdown timer, 186 00:06:15,070 --> 00:06:18,000 forcing you to hit the checkpoints in rapid succession - 187 00:06:18,000 --> 00:06:19,720 something that I've always assumed was placed there 188 00:06:19,720 --> 00:06:21,760 to keep you from ever veering too far off the path 189 00:06:21,760 --> 00:06:23,650 and breaking the game somehow. 190 00:06:23,650 --> 00:06:24,760 Still, I've always wondered about 191 00:06:24,760 --> 00:06:26,410 the actual limitations of this mission, 192 00:06:26,410 --> 00:06:28,440 and I knew that this time around I wanted to test out 193 00:06:28,440 --> 00:06:30,300 whether or not there was any way to escape - 194 00:06:30,300 --> 00:06:32,390 so before finishing the mission, I paused, 195 00:06:32,390 --> 00:06:34,460 started it over, and then this time, 196 00:06:34,460 --> 00:06:35,990 instead of starting the race as intended, 197 00:06:35,990 --> 00:06:37,550 I swung the car into a 180, 198 00:06:37,550 --> 00:06:40,240 driving the car backwards in the wrong direction. 199 00:06:40,240 --> 00:06:41,870 Now, when I do this, the AI driver 200 00:06:41,870 --> 00:06:43,120 immediately begins panicking, 201 00:06:43,120 --> 00:06:44,530 rapidly spinning the steering wheel 202 00:06:44,530 --> 00:06:47,290 trying desperately to keep my car visible in frame, 203 00:06:47,290 --> 00:06:49,620 and then eventually, it turns around 180 degrees 204 00:06:49,620 --> 00:06:53,440 to reveal what looks like the entire open world 205 00:06:53,440 --> 00:06:54,590 of Driver: San Francisco - 206 00:06:54,590 --> 00:06:57,520 seemingly 100% accessible to the player. 207 00:06:57,520 --> 00:07:00,120 Now I drove away from the racetrack and began exploring, 208 00:07:00,120 --> 00:07:03,110 and I kept bracing myself to hit some kind of invisible wall 209 00:07:03,110 --> 00:07:04,960 or failure state for going off course, 210 00:07:04,960 --> 00:07:08,100 but it never happened. It all actually worked. 211 00:07:08,100 --> 00:07:09,090 I merged into traffic 212 00:07:09,090 --> 00:07:11,010 and the second-person camera followed me, 213 00:07:11,010 --> 00:07:12,570 immaculately bobbing and weaving 214 00:07:12,570 --> 00:07:14,120 through the other cars on the road. 215 00:07:14,120 --> 00:07:15,700 It was around this time that I noticed... 216 00:07:15,700 --> 00:07:16,880 there was no timer. 217 00:07:17,280 --> 00:07:18,390 It turns out that Reflections 218 00:07:18,390 --> 00:07:20,030 had generously designed this mission, 219 00:07:20,030 --> 00:07:21,750 intentionally or unintentionally, 220 00:07:21,750 --> 00:07:23,120 so that the mission countdown timer 221 00:07:23,120 --> 00:07:25,960 doesn't actually begin until you reach the first checkpoint - 222 00:07:25,960 --> 00:07:28,100 meaning that if you never hit that first checkpoint, 223 00:07:28,100 --> 00:07:29,990 you can drive around forever. 224 00:07:29,990 --> 00:07:33,750 (car engine roaring) 225 00:07:33,750 --> 00:07:35,230 (car passing on right honks) 226 00:07:35,230 --> 00:07:37,070 This led to what I can only describe 227 00:07:37,070 --> 00:07:39,470 as a transcendent video game experience. 228 00:07:39,470 --> 00:07:41,100 It felt like I was seeing something 229 00:07:41,100 --> 00:07:42,870 that I was never meant to see. 230 00:07:42,870 --> 00:07:46,510 This ability to explore the city as much as I wanted to 231 00:07:46,510 --> 00:07:48,630 all from this wholly unique, 232 00:07:48,630 --> 00:07:51,570 extremely surreal second-person viewpoint: 233 00:07:51,570 --> 00:07:53,170 it felt like a magical experience 234 00:07:53,170 --> 00:07:54,560 and one that almost nobody else 235 00:07:54,560 --> 00:07:55,940 has experienced for themselves. 236 00:07:56,500 --> 00:07:57,730 Now, revisiting this mission 237 00:07:57,730 --> 00:07:59,420 and managing to escape the confines 238 00:07:59,420 --> 00:08:01,690 laid down by the developers all those years ago, 239 00:08:01,690 --> 00:08:04,680 I really wanted to try and push this thing to its limits. 240 00:08:04,680 --> 00:08:06,430 I couldn't resit trying to break things a little: 241 00:08:06,430 --> 00:08:09,750 I drove the car off ramps, into upcoming traffic, all of it. 242 00:08:09,750 --> 00:08:12,000 But surprisingly, it held together perfectly. 243 00:08:12,000 --> 00:08:14,840 That is, until I tried one specific thing. 244 00:08:14,840 --> 00:08:16,140 See, I haven't talked about it before, 245 00:08:16,140 --> 00:08:18,990 but this mission actually does have a failure condition. 246 00:08:18,990 --> 00:08:20,310 In the lower-right corner of the screen 247 00:08:20,310 --> 00:08:21,180 there's a health meter, 248 00:08:21,180 --> 00:08:23,000 and it represents the health of Tanner's car: 249 00:08:23,000 --> 00:08:25,620 the car you're chasing / driving. 250 00:08:25,620 --> 00:08:27,130 But if you get into one too many collisions 251 00:08:27,130 --> 00:08:28,650 while driving this car in the second person, 252 00:08:28,650 --> 00:08:30,580 you can actually run out of health, 253 00:08:30,580 --> 00:08:33,390 causing Tanner to die and the mission to end in a loss. 254 00:08:33,390 --> 00:08:35,140 This is actually pretty hard to achieve 255 00:08:35,140 --> 00:08:36,770 on the default mission path they laid out, 256 00:08:36,770 --> 00:08:38,820 but driving into oncoming lanes of traffic 257 00:08:38,820 --> 00:08:40,420 and ramping off car transporters 258 00:08:40,420 --> 00:08:41,850 had taken its toll on my vehicle 259 00:08:41,850 --> 00:08:44,250 and I only had a small sliver of health left. 260 00:08:44,250 --> 00:08:46,450 Wanting to explore this mission as long as possible, 261 00:08:46,450 --> 00:08:49,480 I gingerly pulled Tanner's car into a narrow alleyway 262 00:08:49,480 --> 00:08:51,300 and then decided to try out the one thing 263 00:08:51,300 --> 00:08:52,240 I hadn't attempted yet: 264 00:08:52,860 --> 00:08:54,700 I turned around and drove the car, 265 00:08:54,700 --> 00:08:56,120 in the second person, 266 00:08:56,120 --> 00:08:57,860 directly at myself. 267 00:08:57,863 --> 00:09:00,410 (music) 268 00:09:00,410 --> 00:09:02,300 This put the AI driver in a weird position. 269 00:09:02,300 --> 00:09:05,030 It now had to drive backwards just to keep me in the frame, 270 00:09:05,030 --> 00:09:06,480 and it was also narrowly sandwiched 271 00:09:06,480 --> 00:09:08,200 between the two walls of the alley, 272 00:09:08,200 --> 00:09:10,360 giving it almost no room to maneuver. 273 00:09:10,360 --> 00:09:11,590 I kept driving towards myself, 274 00:09:11,590 --> 00:09:14,343 putting on the pressure, closer and closer, and then... 275 00:09:14,343 --> 00:09:15,940 (car engine roaring) 276 00:09:15,940 --> 00:09:16,940 (car screeching) 277 00:09:19,020 --> 00:09:19,845 (cars crashing) 278 00:09:19,845 --> 00:09:21,260 - [Leila] Nice work. 279 00:09:21,260 --> 00:09:22,540 - It broke. 280 00:09:22,540 --> 00:09:25,420 All at once, the second-person vehicle shoots into a wall, 281 00:09:25,420 --> 00:09:26,253 clips through it, 282 00:09:26,253 --> 00:09:28,870 and then launches hundreds of feet into the air. 283 00:09:28,870 --> 00:09:30,210 Briefly, one frame at a time, 284 00:09:30,210 --> 00:09:32,400 we can get glimpses of the chaos that unfolded: 285 00:09:32,400 --> 00:09:34,060 we see the car inside the wall, 286 00:09:34,060 --> 00:09:36,850 then we see the car's front console flipped over; 287 00:09:36,850 --> 00:09:38,910 we see what appears to be the ocean floor 288 00:09:38,910 --> 00:09:41,660 and then the pavement as seen from underneath; 289 00:09:41,660 --> 00:09:43,920 we see rooftops, the driver's arm, 290 00:09:43,920 --> 00:09:46,970 the sky, trees, abstract geometry - 291 00:09:46,970 --> 00:09:49,220 and then the city from above, 292 00:09:49,220 --> 00:09:51,530 flooded with unloaded geometry. 293 00:09:51,530 --> 00:09:53,880 After that, we see the car spinning and spinning in mid air, 294 00:09:53,880 --> 00:09:55,910 giving us glimpses of San Francisco from above, 295 00:09:55,910 --> 00:09:57,750 before finally getting so high 296 00:09:57,750 --> 00:10:01,440 that nothing can be seen but endless ocean. 297 00:10:01,440 --> 00:10:02,970 And then, 298 00:10:02,970 --> 00:10:04,085 black. 299 00:10:04,085 --> 00:10:06,860 (music) 300 00:10:06,860 --> 00:10:09,780 Suddenly, all at once, the car snaps back to earth. 301 00:10:09,780 --> 00:10:12,860 The health meter for Tanner's vehicle turns blindingly white 302 00:10:12,860 --> 00:10:14,200 and then the second-person viewpoint 303 00:10:14,200 --> 00:10:17,420 fills with an orange-yellow hue: Tanner's car. 304 00:10:17,420 --> 00:10:19,410 Quickly it becomes clear that the second-person car 305 00:10:19,410 --> 00:10:22,200 has somehow spawned inside of Tanner's vehicle, 306 00:10:22,200 --> 00:10:24,199 dealing infinite damage to the car. 307 00:10:24,199 --> 00:10:25,560 (cars crashing) 308 00:10:25,560 --> 00:10:27,400 A deafening crash sound can be heard 309 00:10:27,400 --> 00:10:28,860 and shattered glass flies everywhere, 310 00:10:28,860 --> 00:10:32,160 and then, for a brief moment, right before the mission ends, 311 00:10:32,160 --> 00:10:35,270 the camera inexplicably shifts into Tanner's car 312 00:10:35,270 --> 00:10:36,870 where the car is balanced on its nose, 313 00:10:36,870 --> 00:10:38,000 its windshield shattered, 314 00:10:38,000 --> 00:10:40,810 thrust impossibly through another vehicle. 315 00:10:40,810 --> 00:10:43,360 And then, horrifically, the camera clips 316 00:10:43,360 --> 00:10:45,610 through the back of Tanner's partner's head 317 00:10:45,610 --> 00:10:48,580 and shows us the backside of his eyeballs and tongue: 318 00:10:48,580 --> 00:10:51,140 a truly terrifying second-person perspective 319 00:10:51,140 --> 00:10:52,287 if ever there was one. 320 00:10:52,287 --> 00:10:54,870 (music) 321 00:10:59,740 --> 00:11:02,080 Shaken by my other-worldly encounter seemingly brought on 322 00:11:02,080 --> 00:11:04,980 by pushing this already existential mission to its limits, 323 00:11:04,980 --> 00:11:05,980 I reset the mission 324 00:11:05,980 --> 00:11:08,630 and played it beginning to end one last time - 325 00:11:08,630 --> 00:11:10,930 this time careful to do it the right way, 326 00:11:10,930 --> 00:11:13,160 not wanting to disturb whatever eldritch being 327 00:11:13,160 --> 00:11:15,580 I'd upset by breaking the mission in the first place. 328 00:11:15,580 --> 00:11:17,920 After all, I thought, I know that every mission 329 00:11:17,920 --> 00:11:19,010 in Driver: San Francisco 330 00:11:19,010 --> 00:11:21,440 ends with a continue and retry option, 331 00:11:21,440 --> 00:11:23,370 so if I really wanted to explore this mission again, 332 00:11:23,370 --> 00:11:25,770 I could always hit the retry button to give it another shot 333 00:11:25,770 --> 00:11:27,170 after running through it normally. 334 00:11:27,170 --> 00:11:29,540 So I proceeded to complete the mission as intended - 335 00:11:29,540 --> 00:11:32,880 a mission, by the way, that ends with the antagonist Jericho 336 00:11:32,880 --> 00:11:34,420 actually taking over your body 337 00:11:34,420 --> 00:11:37,174 and attempting to drive you into a lethal car accident: 338 00:11:37,174 --> 00:11:39,680 (car engine roaring) - You mean... Jericho! 339 00:11:39,680 --> 00:11:42,010 - [Leila] Sit back and enjoy the show. 340 00:11:42,010 --> 00:11:45,140 Not many people get to watch themselves die. 341 00:11:45,140 --> 00:11:46,960 - ...a problem that Tanner decides to solve 342 00:11:46,960 --> 00:11:48,860 by, disturbingly enough, shifting 343 00:11:48,860 --> 00:11:50,890 for the first and only time in the game 344 00:11:50,890 --> 00:11:53,040 into his partner Jones' body. 345 00:11:53,040 --> 00:11:54,170 Yes, that partner. 346 00:11:54,170 --> 00:11:55,820 - [Jones] What the heII is going on? 347 00:11:55,820 --> 00:11:57,520 - Anyways, I go to finish the mission 348 00:11:57,520 --> 00:11:58,920 the normal way, staying on the path, 349 00:11:58,920 --> 00:12:00,290 fully expecting the restart option 350 00:12:00,290 --> 00:12:02,190 that appears after most missions to show up. 351 00:12:02,190 --> 00:12:04,280 Instead, I get to the end of the mission, and - 352 00:12:04,280 --> 00:12:06,260 for some reason that I still can't explain - 353 00:12:06,260 --> 00:12:08,070 the only option was continue. 354 00:12:08,070 --> 00:12:10,053 The reset option had vanished. 355 00:12:10,900 --> 00:12:13,490 Panicked, I quickly hit ALT+F4 and existed the game, 356 00:12:13,490 --> 00:12:15,020 hoping I could load up my save file 357 00:12:15,020 --> 00:12:17,080 and play through the mission again, but it was too late. 358 00:12:17,080 --> 00:12:18,770 It had already autosaved over my file 359 00:12:18,770 --> 00:12:22,854 and the mission was gone with no way to replay it again. 360 00:12:22,854 --> 00:12:26,090 (music) 361 00:12:26,090 --> 00:12:28,250 Look, Driver: San Francisco is a game 362 00:12:28,250 --> 00:12:30,820 full of weird, interesting, strikingly-designed missions - 363 00:12:30,820 --> 00:12:32,830 but, to me, "The Target" has always stood out 364 00:12:32,830 --> 00:12:36,100 as the perfect example of what makes this game special. 365 00:12:36,100 --> 00:12:37,970 Video games are an entire medium 366 00:12:37,970 --> 00:12:39,870 built around taking over others' bodies, 367 00:12:39,870 --> 00:12:42,570 and Driver: San Francisco is a richly existential 368 00:12:42,570 --> 00:12:45,160 and metatextual reflection of this idea. 369 00:12:45,160 --> 00:12:47,260 This mission in particular brought these ideas to the fore 370 00:12:47,260 --> 00:12:49,150 in a way that I wasn't fully prepared for 371 00:12:49,150 --> 00:12:51,350 and that I'm only now beginning to wrap my head around, 372 00:12:51,350 --> 00:12:52,940 years and years later. 373 00:12:52,940 --> 00:12:54,540 Even writing the script for this video 374 00:12:54,540 --> 00:12:56,290 felt like a mind-bending exercise 375 00:12:56,290 --> 00:12:57,500 in trying to explain something 376 00:12:57,500 --> 00:12:59,390 that is borderline unexplainable. 377 00:12:59,390 --> 00:13:00,700 You really have to play it for yourself 378 00:13:00,700 --> 00:13:04,140 to get a full sense of how crazy this mission feels. 379 00:13:04,140 --> 00:13:06,330 In designing this mission, Reflections took decades 380 00:13:06,330 --> 00:13:08,870 of 3D video game conventions and turned them on their head 381 00:13:08,870 --> 00:13:12,150 to create what feels a truly out-of-body experience. 382 00:13:12,150 --> 00:13:15,350 That, to me, is an accomplishment worth celebrating. 383 00:13:15,350 --> 00:13:16,931 Please play "Driver: San Francisco." 384 00:13:16,931 --> 00:13:17,890 (car engine roaring) 385 00:13:17,890 --> 00:13:20,510 - [Leila] If you're here, who's in your body? 386 00:13:20,510 --> 00:13:21,710 - [Tanner] Well, no one. 387 00:13:22,628 --> 00:13:23,461 ...oh God. 388 00:13:25,222 --> 00:13:26,559 (door shuts) 389 00:13:26,559 --> 00:13:27,755 (keys jingling) 390 00:13:27,755 --> 00:13:29,540 (car revving) 391 00:13:29,540 --> 00:13:30,900 - All right, so a couple quick updates 392 00:13:30,900 --> 00:13:33,450 on the "Driver: San Francisco" situation. 393 00:13:33,450 --> 00:13:35,640 The petition to get Ubisoft to re-list the game 394 00:13:35,640 --> 00:13:37,240 that I mentioned at the end of my last video 395 00:13:37,240 --> 00:13:41,530 is now at over 70,000 signatures, which is insane. 396 00:13:41,530 --> 00:13:43,390 Please, if you have any interest in this game, 397 00:13:43,390 --> 00:13:44,810 please sign this petition. 398 00:13:44,810 --> 00:13:47,880 It now feels like 100,000 is within our grasp, 399 00:13:47,880 --> 00:13:49,940 which is crazy, and I can't believe I'm saying, 400 00:13:49,940 --> 00:13:51,510 but it could happen - 401 00:13:51,510 --> 00:13:53,630 which, to me, feels like an unignorable number. 402 00:13:53,630 --> 00:13:55,750 But! In the meantime, as you might have noticed, 403 00:13:55,750 --> 00:13:57,180 Ubisoft has not re-listed the game - 404 00:13:57,180 --> 00:14:00,480 they have been ignoring the 70,000 signatures we have. 405 00:14:00,480 --> 00:14:03,247 And on a totally unrelated note, not connected at all, 406 00:14:03,247 --> 00:14:05,390 Driver: San Francisco, since my video last month, 407 00:14:05,390 --> 00:14:07,940 has been in the top 10 most downloaded games 408 00:14:07,940 --> 00:14:09,130 on The Pirate Bay. 409 00:14:09,130 --> 00:14:10,810 ...totally no relationship there, 410 00:14:10,810 --> 00:14:12,210 not mentioning that for any reason at all. 411 00:14:12,210 --> 00:14:14,410 Just saying, the game is not available 412 00:14:14,410 --> 00:14:16,630 and it's also one of the most pirated video games, 413 00:14:16,630 --> 00:14:19,500 and has been in the top 10 most pirated games 414 00:14:19,500 --> 00:14:20,450 for the past month. 415 00:14:21,950 --> 00:14:22,880 Just a coincidence. 416 00:14:22,880 --> 00:14:24,730 Also, totally unrelated to the fact 417 00:14:24,730 --> 00:14:28,940 that this game is apparently very popular on Pirate Bay, 418 00:14:28,940 --> 00:14:32,970 did you know that if you go to NordVPN.org/babylonian 419 00:14:32,970 --> 00:14:37,970 you can go to websites, illicit or non-illicit, 420 00:14:38,020 --> 00:14:40,690 without being tracked by your ISP or anybody else? 421 00:14:40,690 --> 00:14:42,010 So that means that, for example, 422 00:14:42,010 --> 00:14:44,570 if you were to go to - and I'm not saying you should - 423 00:14:44,570 --> 00:14:47,750 a website that allowed you to download a video game 424 00:14:47,750 --> 00:14:49,810 that is no longer available and can be easily pirated 425 00:14:49,810 --> 00:14:50,920 with just a few clicks 426 00:14:50,920 --> 00:14:53,060 and you don't wanna get an angry email from your ISP 427 00:14:53,060 --> 00:14:54,410 saying you can't do that, 428 00:14:54,410 --> 00:14:56,560 you should invest in a VPN. (laughs) 429 00:14:56,560 --> 00:14:58,880 If you go to NordVPN.org/babylonian 430 00:14:58,880 --> 00:15:00,650 and use coupon code "babylonian", 431 00:15:00,650 --> 00:15:02,580 you'll get 70% off their three-year plan 432 00:15:02,580 --> 00:15:05,500 and get one full month of VPN coverage free. 433 00:15:05,500 --> 00:15:07,280 But yeah, if you enjoyed this video, 434 00:15:07,280 --> 00:15:09,530 please share it with anyone you think would like it, 435 00:15:09,530 --> 00:15:11,900 and/or subscribe to my channel 436 00:15:11,900 --> 00:15:13,540 if you'd like to see more stuff like this in the future. 437 00:15:13,540 --> 00:15:14,760 I've got a lot of videos 438 00:15:14,760 --> 00:15:16,830 in various stages of production right now 439 00:15:16,830 --> 00:15:19,770 that I'm really excited to get out into the world, 440 00:15:19,770 --> 00:15:20,603 and I can finally start thinking about them 441 00:15:20,603 --> 00:15:21,790 now that this one's done. 442 00:15:21,790 --> 00:15:24,450 So yeah, that's it from me for this time. 443 00:15:24,450 --> 00:15:26,880 Hopefully the next video comes out a little quicker. 444 00:15:26,880 --> 00:15:28,270 I've got a lot of ideas that have nothing to do 445 00:15:28,270 --> 00:15:30,570 with Driver: SF, I just... this one 446 00:15:31,520 --> 00:15:33,340 has been on my mind for a while 447 00:15:33,340 --> 00:15:34,790 and I'm glad to finally have it done. 448 00:15:34,790 --> 00:15:37,760 So thank you for watching, and I'll see you next time. 449 00:15:37,760 --> 00:15:39,380 (music)