Editor’s note: This review was written by Benjamin Jaekle, a student at Full Sail University. Benjamin holds a bachelor's degree in creative writing from the State University of New York.

Rockstar’s Bully aims to tell a story not unlike The Chocolate War, Harry Potter or other boarding school tales by lining its gameplay with an eccentric open world and some excellent characters (or perhaps caricatures would be more accurate). I feel the gameplay is a huge complement to the story, thanks to the free-roaming, skipping-school-with-no-responsibilities vibe punctuated by missions, which the player only ever takes on voluntarily by stepping into a clearly-marked area.

The story of Bully takes place at the notorious boarding school Bullworth Academy and its neighboring town, which is divided into a commercial district, a hazy slum, a posh suburban neighborhood and an always-open fair full of freaks and carnival games. Surviving in Bullworth is more fun for the detail present in the game’s art direction; I was always particularly struck by the small bits of paper that littered the sidewalks. The world is populated by other students, all divided into cliques. These cliques are old — I’m sure traditional Greasers haven’t been a problem for society in several decades — but they still represent their niches nicely. Contending for dominance of the school are the snooty preps, the aggressive jocks, the smarmy greasers, the socially inept nerds and a more ambiguous group of violent guys in untucked white shirts, the bullies. Each faction’s respect for the player varies, and although the factions each feature a few key members who move the story along, beating up on any jock will make the other jocks more prone to attacking in the hallways, on the quad or on the streets of the suburbs — which in turn amplifies the experience of being a school kid.

Bully’s protagonist is a kid named Jimmy, who seems to have a track record of mischief and disobedience. His mother dumps him off at Bullworth in the hopes he can learn some respect, while she goes off on a yearlong honeymoon with her new older husband. Jimmy is introduced to a whole schoolyard of individuals, including the manipulating, misanthropic Gary, whose machinations (and whose use of Jimmy as tool and scapegoat) drive the main action of the story. The principal of the school is also gunning for Jimmy, and only a few offbeat characters — notably a nerdy kid named Petey, the drunken English teacher Mr. Galloway and the dreamy art teacher Ms. Phillips — ever come down on Jimmy’s side. Jimmy even learns fisticuffs from a crazy hobo living behind the school who teaches new moves in return for helping him to teleport away to another world (which, in a strange moment, he actually does.)

The story is well-acted and animated (some of the best production values available, I would say) with the colorful, sometimes insane characters helping to flesh out a world that every product of the American school system remembers inhabiting at one point. The game design helps make the story feel real and alive. By taking a hands-off approach and allowing the player to go anywhere and do anything whenever, Rockstar masterfully captures the feel of being a truant schoolboy. Going to classes (and dodging prefects when playing hooky!) and delivering flowers to girls in exchange for their affection are just two of the many details that flesh out a living, breathing world occupied by unique characters who invariably feel one way or the other about the player, based on what missions are undertaken and who gets roughed up. The game’s missions include going on dates at the carnival, escorting nerds to their lockers, fouling up football practice and laying siege to the geeks’ fortress of solitude.

Rockstar’s signature irreverence is present. The authority figures in the story are all spectacularly flawed. One subplot involves a girl who was expelled after she complained her teacher hit on her. The gym coach, when encountered coming out of a porn shop, will send Jimmy on a mission to raid the girls’ dormitory and bring back a handful of underwear. The English teacher, like any good scholar of poetry, is a drunkard with a seemingly limitless supply of scotch hidden in his classroom. The students also make tongue-in-cheek references to their own flaws, such as the preps referencing the incest of their upper crust families or the geeks likening their current situations to those presented by their Dungeons & Dragons campaigns. Even small details — like the coach referring to Jimmy as a really strong girl or the waddling walk of the alpha nerd Algernon — add a grand dose of humor to the overall feel of the game.

Although Bully thrives on truancy, irreverence and combat between hormonal male students, the game does have a higher moral code that is strongly enforced. Hitting a girl, for instance, will result in an almost-instantaneous and inescapable grab from any nearby prefect, policeman or teacher, followed by a lecture and a relatively boring detention minigame. The more violently the player behaves, the more harshly the game reacts, forcing extreme behavior to be met with extreme consequence. This system helps keep the player in check, and I felt it aligned my gameplay behavior with the story behavior of Jimmy.

I consider Bully to be one of the best combinations of story and gameplay available in the medium. Often considered something of an offshoot of the Grand Theft Auto series, Bully shuns its predecessors by creating a tighter, more detailed world at a more manageable scale and populating that world with memorable characters instead of soulless pedestrians. The interaction between the story and the world is the main attraction here — in Bully, the story, the feel of the world and the story missions all interact very neatly. Bully has now seen release on three consoles and the PC, and I rate it a must-play for those who enjoy a good adventure game or a good romp through the memories of crazy youth.