How ‘Driver San Francisco’ Best Exemplifies What a Second Person Video Game Might Look Like

In a highly informative video essay, gaming vlogger Nick Robinson denotes the difference between first person perspective games and third person perspective games before launching into an explanation of second-person perspective.

Most 3D, character-driven video games can be pretty easily placed into one of two categories: either first person or third person. In a first-person game, you see the game world through the actual eyes of the player character as though you were that character, and in a third-person game, you see the player character from the outside… But the existence of these two perspectives begs a question: …what exactly would second-person look like?

To elaborate his point, Robinson uses a mission within the game Driver San Francisco to best exemplify how this perspective can be put to use.

Strangely enough, I actually found the answer to this before I even came up with the question,
and, believe it or not, it came to me courtesy of a game …and that game is Driver: San Francisco. See, for all the interesting missions in Driver: San Francisco – and there are plenty of them – there’s one mission in particular…I think about all the time. The mission in question is called “The Target” and it’s the final mission of chapter six of the game.