No Sleep Till Brooklyn: "Grand Theft Auto V" and the Eight-Hour Midnight Marathon

The Id, ego and super-ego are the three components defined by Sigmund Freud's structural model of the human psyche. Whether accidental, or intentional, Rockstar has created a Freud psyche simulator.

Franklin, Trevor, and Michael, the three protagonists of Grand Theft Auto V, all function as interactive representatives of Freud's model of the human psyche. Think about it.

According to Freud's model of the psyche, the id (Trevor) is the set of uncoordinated instinctual trends; the super-ego (Franklin) plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego (Michael) is the organized, realistic part that mediates between the desires of the id and the super-ego. Let off the chain, Trevor would succumb (more than he already does) to every base instinct and primal urge the world would allow. Franklin knows that he is better than the sum of his parts. Attempting to overcome his neighborhood and his upbringing. He is hungry for bigger things and will take any opportunity he can to challenge his fate. Michael is the equilibrium between the two. The foil that must balance the two and adheres to some sort of manufactured moral code.

I haven't slept in 24 hours and I'm pretty sure Rockstar just confirmed this theory via radio waves to my brains.

The Experiment: Marathon Grand Theft Auto V for eight straight hours. From the Monday midnight release till the following morning.

The Rules: 1 bathroom break every two hours. Any additive/chemical assistance to remain awake is fair game. Ended up going with a split between Five Hour Energy and iced coffee. GTA V and only GTA V. No Instagram, no playing another title to take a breather, no Twitter, no Internets, and no sourcing from forums for reveals in real time. Blind and into the 65 plus hour game I must go.

The Goal: To explore as much of the side missions, attractions, map, and non-main story points of interest in Los Santos and Blaine County. How much could I find in eight hours by delaying the main plot and getting lost in Rockstar's construct. If a main missions needs to be accomplished before an area on the map can be revealed, clear the mission and get back to exploring the city.

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12:30am
Deaths: 0

I'm immediately and instantly overwhelmed with how big this map is. Los Santos and Blaine country are intimidating in all the right ways—"monstrous" is the only word I can come up with. I've logged over 80 hours in Skyrim and I understand how scale can be used to dwarf a player, but this map has me grinning like a retired linebacker with a nitrous addiction.

You'll instantly notice how improved the driving mechanic is in the game. GTA IV was rightfully criticized for shoddy vehicle handling. The spinning out for no reason, slipping off the road like someone coated your tires in KY, and generally not adhering to any physics whatsoever? All gone. Realistic driving that's tough but fair is the order of the day. I find myself trying to explore as much of Los Santos while listening to Ice Cube on the West Coast only hip-hop station.

With this seemingly endless universe open before me, I fall prey to my ADD and choose to watch a movie downtown. I catch the 2pm showing of The Loneliest Robot in Britain. It's an animated short that scathingly skewers income inequality, the death of the middle class, the loss of the manufacturing industry thanks to outsourcing, the mortgage crisis, and infidelity.

The film ran eight minutes and was a perfect satirical appetizer on the modern human condition. I left the movie theatre knowing that a life of crime is somehow justified in the face of what can only be seen as institutionalized disenfranchisement.

1:30am
Deaths by vehicle: 2
Barbershops visited: 1
Cars stolen: 14

We can all agree that GTA IV, while amazing, lacked certain elements that made previous GTA games so memorable. Namely: Niko Bellic's story was fucking depressing. Well-written, well-acted, and well-played, sure, but the implications of his past were a constant brooding companion. War crimes, human trafficking, and a life lived within the confines of a battle zone are all implied as you make your way through Liberty City. In GTA IV, your path to the American Dream and redemption was going to be as morally bankrupt as anything Nikko experienced in Eastern Europe.

Los Santos offers a visual contrast that 's felt from your first moments in the city. It's bright, distracting, and its inhabitants are all dying for the their 15 minutes of fame. I'm two hours into the game and find myself constantly distracted by Rockstar's flawless art design.

As Frankin, I'm surrounded by the bleak confines of what's basically South Central, and find myself immediately sympathizing with the youngest and hungriest of the three protagonists. I'd want to get the fuck out as well.

I visit the closest barbershop and make myself look as close to Rick Ross as the game will allow. Sporting a full beard and a shaved head, I'm greeted by a billboard outside which reads "Sell Grandma's Gold! Cash for dead dreams!" and I'm grateful that Rockstar's decided to truly embrace the caustic and cynical sense of humor that had defined previous games.

I check the text message on my smartphone and realize I'm late for an opportunity to repossess a stolen sports bike.

2:30am
Money: $8,349
Boats stolen: 3
Strip clubs visited: 1

Los Santos serves up plenty of options for the outdoorsman, the athlete, and those adhering to clean living. But while I'm all for distractions, I've got a stack of dirty money burning a hole in my pocket.

Why hadn't I noticed this strip club earlier?

The Grand Theft Auto series, in its modern incarnation, has never shied away from the inclusion of implied prostitution in their titles. From Grand Theft Auto III all the way up to GTA IV the titles have always included some representation of sex workers. Streetwalkers, porn-stars, and strippers have always been a source for supporting cast members in the series. That's not even taking into consideration nudity mods.

And on this painfully sunny Los Santos day, I meet a stripper named Chastity. GTA V proves that fake boobs can still look convincingly real in a poorly lit, well rendered Champagne room. I've spent nearly $300 on private dances with Chastity. There is a 'like' meter on screen and the more that I flirt, tip, touch, and gawk the faster the meter fills.

I tell Chastity how great she looks and offer to rescue her from a life of stripping. She giggles on cue and I move my hands so the bouncer doesn't kick me out for touching. I spend more time than I should here, but something besides the very real, very NSFW digital breasts keeps me here. Rockstar has accomplished in making a virtual strip club as tragically beautiful as any found in the real world. I'm stunned that as long as I have the funds, I can stay here as long as I'd like.

I fill Chastity's like meter and look for a faster car to steal.

3:30am
Money: $5,987
ATVs stolen: 3
Boats stolen: 2
Helicopters stolen: 1

Switching from Franklin to Michael to Trevor is a visually gratifying shortcut to navigating the Pangaea-sized Los Santos. A satellite image of the city zooms up and out, following the labyrinth of highways to your selected protagonist and drops you in the middle of a random, unpredictable moment. Michael meeting a woman we'll never see again for coffee is a brilliant alternative to staring at a load screen. The character swap serves as an amazing geographical shortcut to navigating the map.

Not to get too spoiler heavy, but Michael's family is a fucking mess. After enlisting Franklin to help rescue your insufferably entitled, and spoiled-beyond-repair son, I've wound up on the eastern shore of Los Santos. The Del Perro Piers offer a moment of respite from Michael’s home life. I ride a carousel to clear my head and immediately spy a horsefly black helicopter buzzing the shoreline. It lands next to a clutch of volleyball nets. I get off the carousel as fast as I can and steal an ATV idling on the beach.

There's only open sand between my first jacked chopper and me. The sun is setting on the horizon and the Pacific beckons to me. This game is beautiful, and I just saw the face of God on the water's reflection. I tell the chopper pilot to get the fuck out if he wants to live and immediately start tracing the shore. I constantly check my mini-map to see how much of the landmass I'm uncovering. A point on the map, Fort Zancudo, on the North West shore slaps the shit out of me.

You can steal F-16s in this game. That's a military base. They keep F-16s at military bases. My powers of deduction tell me I need to head to Fort Zancudo. And while this chopper is cool, it's also painfully slow. Balls. I'm still over the ocean.

My solution to the problems of both time and distance is speeding north below me. It's a lipstick red cigarette boat and it's got my name all over it. I match the speedboat's acceleratio with my chopper and leap to its gleaming carapace. Kicking a joyriding couple out of the boat, I check my mini-map for the fastest way to Fort Zancudo.

I have just fallen in love with this game. I want it to bear my children.

4:30am
Money: $7,950
Helicopters stolen: 1
Tanks stolen: 0
F-16s stolen: 0
Death by tank: 1

Turns out sneaking into a military base is harder than it would seem. The place is surrounded by guards, barbed wire, tanks...and wait...I want a tank. I find an ATV foolishly unattended and circle the military base looking for a way in. I'm going to get a tank, or an F-16, if I must, if it kills me. I find the lip of a rocky outcropping and am convinced that gravity and confidence will allow me to sail my ATV over the walls.

I am a fucking genius. An immensely gratifying slow-motion pan out shows my ATV gliding over the fence like an Olympic pole-vaulter. I stick the landing and am doing donuts in the military base's obstacle course. I'm sure the main missions of this game are amazing, but right now this is what it means to play a GTA title. Exploration, risk reward, and discovering that you and the people at Rockstar want the exact same thing. I get off the ATV and attempt to stealth scout the base.

Turns out I'm an idiot. The second I get off, I'm rewarded with a four star wanted level and every soldier in the base is firing assault rifles at me. I attempt to outrun them on my ATV, barrel through a guard station, turn a corner and am promptly vaporized by a waiting tank.

This. This right here. This is why Rockstar can wait half a decade between releases.

When the celestials finally upload my consciousness into the singularity machine, this memory is what I'm going to point to when they ask why humans spent so much time playing video games.

5:30am
Money: $4,929
Death by tank: 1
Motorcycles stolen: 6
Total deaths: 19

I've been playing for six hours straight and I think my dog has lost some respect for me. My girlfriend only stuck her head in once and that was during the strip club. I tried to introduce here to Chastity, but I haven't seen her since. I may have an easier go earning back the dog's respect.

I've been vaporized. I've drown. I've fallen off the freeway. I've been thrown from the back of more than one motorcycle. After the satisfying failure of the F-16 heist, I am revived at the closest hospital in North Chumash near Mount Josiah. Rockstar has not only given Los Angeles and the Nevada desert a perfect translation into GTA V, Northern California and the Sierra/Tahoe region is here in all of its deeply wooded glory.

Maybe this is what Michael needs. To say, 'fuck it' and leave all of his mid-life existential crises behind. Move up here and get an honest job at the lumber mill. Leave his worries behind, settle down with a waitress and start his life over.

I realize that this is fatigue fueled weakness talking and steal a monster truck with an ample lift kit. I still need to uncover more of the map and if I'm reading this right, there is more than one location to go skydiving in this area. I take a gondola to the top of Mt. Chiliad. From here I can see all of Blaine County and both coasts. Like Red Dead Redemption you can choose to sit back and enjoy the scenery of the transit in real time or skip to your destination. I press start and am breathing in the summit.

Are those mountain bikes? Yes, yes they are.

And here is a bike path down back to the base of the mountain. Gaining speed, I'm bunny-hopping gaps in the rocks trying to achieve bonuses for stunt jumps.

I fail. As I tumble down the side of the mountain I am overcome with how much of this game I've barely uncovered in the short time its been in my possession. I want to die and I want to live again to die all over.

My time in the north is done as my bones shatter and bend into unnatural angles.

6:30am
Money: $10,565
Total deaths: 22
Money invested in stock market: $900

After completing a smattering of main story missions to move along the plot, I realize that Franklin needs a new gun. All three of the protagonists have specialized skills that can used to accomplish specific tasks. Franklin is the wheelman and has the ability to 'bullet time' a car when behind the wheel. Thusly, his proficiency with a firearm could use a little stat building.

The sun is coming up and I wonder what my 98-year-old great grandmother would think of this game. The last time I saw her, she asked me what 'Tweeter' was because she saw it on the news. I lost her when I used the term micro-blogging. Here's a woman who lived through the Great Depression and every major American military action in the 20th Century. And here I am, spending imaginary money in an imaginary shooting range to improve my imaginary skill with a gun.

I should have eaten something before I started this experiment.

7:30am
Money: $12,054
Death by cops: 3
Selfies taken: 1
Heists in planning: 1

I've played for eight straight hours, and have little to show for it.

I'm somehow proud of this. I feel sorry for the user that mainlines the story in order to see the goal line. I've played golf, terrorized my estranged cuckolding wife, lived the unrepentant life of morally bankrupt men, been an accomplice to drive-bys, and rescued my daughter from drug running, porn producers on the back of a jet-ski. I've logged eight hours, and barely completed %11 of the games. There are nearly 80 main missions and 65 plus hours of gameplay being advertised by Rockstar.

If it were up to me I'd keep playing Grand Theft Auto V for another eight straight hours. I've wandered through Los Santos for the better part of a day and haven't even completed my first heist yet.

I still haven't even met Trevor yet.

And you know what? I'm okay with that. I know Trevor is waiting for me out in the desert. I know that I'll get to live out my Resevoir Dogs/Heat fantasy when I kick open the doors of that jewelry store. Side quests have allowed me to see the top of one of the highest peaks in the game, smoke PCP laced joints in a public park, help out a crackhead I came up with, and jog on the beach next to a beautiful woman.

I know all of Los Santos is out there. Waiting. Before I go though, I sneak into my son's bedroom and take a massive hit of his bong. I head to my garage and get into my obscenely expensive sports car that I have customized into a high-speed luxury tank and head north on the Great Ocean Highway.

Bob Seger's 'Hollywood Nights' comes on the radio and I ease back in my seat and let Los Santos swallow me whole.