![]() “It’s really boring to drive across large parts of the game world,” said Miller. The stations were also a clever antidote to the lethargy of making long schlepps across the city for missions. It’s way more immersive than listening to an album or songs on Spotify.” YouTuber Twin Sticks, real name Jack, reviewed the game last year and told us his experience: “If I was playing on the weekend, I’d listen to Fever 105 for more funk stuff, or if I was playing after work and was tired, I’d put on Emotion 98.3 or something more chilled out. They’d put on music that would help them complete a mission because it was more relaxing or generated more adrenaline.” “Some would also pick songs or stations the way we use Spotify to set the mood at the gym or at a dinner party. “Some used the stations to enhance their immersion in 1980s Miami, while others listened to music to create ironic distance from the contract killing mission they were on,” explained Miller. Interviewing Vice City players, Miller found that the way they engaged with the radio stations had a significant impact on their overall experience of the game. In 2002, just a year after the first iPod was released, the concept of switching between different artists and songs while playing a video game was pretty ground-breaking. “They had plenty of connections with major labels and were able to capitalise on these connections, increasingly building popular music content into the games.” “They’d previously worked for BMG and were involved in music video production,” Miller explained. “Almost all of the Vice City soundtrack is existing popular music which was a huge deal and a huge investment in terms of licensing, marketing and making connections with record labels.”Ĭo-founders of Rockstar Games, Dan and Sam Houser, were well placed to take the task on. “Rockstar did an amazing job of world-building through licensed popular music,” Kiri Miller, professor of American Studies at Brown University, told us. Vice City wasn’t the first GTA game to approach music innovatively – GTA 3 featured a radio station that played the soundtrack from 1983’s Scarface – but the canon of music included in Vice City, plucked almost entirely from the ’80s, showed the power of popular music to really immerse players in a specific time and place. The fictional radio hosts are heavily satirised, scripts dripping in hyperbole, as they intersperse the music with surreal talk show segments, fake jingles and spoof ads. Just to name a few, there’s Wildstyle Pirate Radio for hip hop, V-rock for heavy metal, and Emotion 98.3 for power ballads. Hop into a car, any car, and you’ll find seven music radio stations to choose from, each playing their own distinct style of music from the ’80s. It’s a parody of Miami and from its architecture and polyester suits to its fake DJs and violence, it’s all about excess.” “The game draws a lot on the films Miami Vice and Scarface. ![]() “Vice City brought real, pre-existing music into a satire of saturated ’80s aesthetics,” Andra Ivanescu, senior lecturer in Game Studies at Brunel University, told us. From well-revered hits to some more obscure tracks, and genres spanning heavy metal, pop, hip hop and new wave, Rockstar’s sun-soaked venture had something for everyone. ![]() ![]() Set in 1986 Miami, Vice City – an open-world game part of the Grand Theft Auto ( GTA) franchise – introduced players to some of the ’80s most iconic tracks. READ MORE: ‘Silent Hill’ is back, say the rumours – but what does that mean?.This year marks two decades since Rockstar Games released Grand Theft Auto: Vice City – but although the game came out in 2002, Vice City’s veteran players will likely feel more nostalgic for a different decade altogether: the ’80s.
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