It’s 16 September 2013. I’ve just arrived in Japan to cover the Tokyo Game Show. Before I boarded the plane, my life had been consumed for weeks by Grand Theft Auto V. I’d spent six days playing it for every waking second, written a review, and scripted and recorded a video review for IGN, where I was working at the time. The pressure was immense. I had not thought about anything else for so long that the lines between my real life and my virtual life in San Andreas had started to blur; I remember, on a short snack trip to the Co-op across the road from my old flat, vividly envisioning putting my elbow through the window of the Prius parked outside and driving away in it.
That review was published a few hours after I disembarked on the other side of the world. It’s the most popular thing I will ever write, read by more than 10 million people by the end of that year. In the decade since, no game has come close to capturing that level of fervour. From the second Grand Theft Auto V was announced in 2011 until its release, people ate up every scrap of information that Rockstar flung their way.
