"Of all the games in this book, Garry's Mod is perhaps the one that strains the definition of the word 'game' the most."
That's how the 1001 list opens its blurb on Garry's Mod, and I simply couldn't say it any better. Garry's Mod isn't a game. But it could be. It's not an interactive movie, either. But it could be that too.
If anything, Garry's Mod is a toybox, or perhaps a toolbox for creative types. It's definitely a sandbox of sorts, and sandboxes sure make themselves known on this 1001 list. None of this is really telling us what Garry's Mod even is, though. For that, we've got to dive into it headfirst.
Frustrations
Garry's Mod, as the name implies, began life as a mod. Not for a game, like most mods, but for the Source engine which powers basically anything put out by Valve, which tends to be pretty popular in the PC gaming crowds.
A mod for an engine? What's the point in that? I head to the demos section of the main menu to see if I can learn anything, where I find a bunch of user-generated content that I can't see or interact with beyond looking at the preview pictures.
That's not the best of starts, not being able to load a demo. I've been known to do some stupid things, and be a blithering idiot, but this might just take the title. Let's ignore the demos and just... play.
Fun Times
As a mod for the Source engine, Garry's Mod can gobble up assets from games that use the engine that you've already got installed. Instead of playing in a generic flatland sandbox, we can choose a level from Counter-Strike to do stuff in, for example.
Upon loading in, you've a fancy physics gun in hand and a sandbox to work with. Ok. So what shall we do? See how stuff works, I suppose.
Pressing and holding the 'Q' key opens up an asset window where we can drop any of hundreds of objects and models into the environment. A washing machine catches my eye, presumably as a subconscious hint that I need to do the washing.
It pops into existence and using our magical physics gun, we can move it anywhere we like, rotating it around all the axis we could imagine, and even right-clicking to freeze it in place, setting it hovering in mid-air. Physics be damned. Down here, I make the rules. Down here, I make the threats. Down here, I'm God.
Further Frustrations
I'm a pretty stupid deity, though. Wheels generally don't work well that way around, and I've no idea how to actually attach them to objects such that they roll around and do their thing. There isn't exactly a tutorial to follow (though I bet someone has made one), so it's all a case of trial and error. And you know how much I love trial and error...
Forgetting about mobile washing machines for a minute, I drop - quite literally - a scientist into the world, and set about posing him, limb by limb, even down to the facial pose, should I want to do so. After moving his arm and watching whatever parts of his ragdoll that haven't been frozen in the air wobble a little, I get bored and move onto something else.
I find some wheels but don't understand them, and don't fancy faffing about for half an hour to learn more, so I find the rope tool and start spam-clicking some rope tethers into existence, tangling everything up.
Further Fun Times
Lifting the washing machine high into the skies displeases physics, especially when everything is tethered by ropes. Garry's Mod desperately tries to make sense of what's going on, which results in a washing machine looming overhead, dragging, or spinning, a giant iron wheel at head height. And it looks quite menacing.
It hasn't brought my system to a halt, so it's relatively safe to interact with. I use the gravity gun to pick up and fling some engine parts at it, at high speed, but don't notice anything alarming. I don't find where the engines end up, to be honest, but I did use an emitter tool to spawn like twenty of them, so I can't keep track of everything.
And then I wonder just what would happen if I jumped into it. You know, that same urge that you get on top of cliffs, where you think 'Yeah, I could totally jump off this, no problem'. So I do.
Sure enough, it's fatal.
Final Word
And that's Garry's Mod.
Well, it's not, but it is. Garry's Mod comes with Trouble in Terrorist Town these days, where players can gather into a game of The Resistance meets Any First Person Shooter to result in a lopsided permadeath team deathmatch mode where nobody knows who is on what team. Yeah, it's amazing. Never played, only watched, enjoyed every minute.
But that's a game built using the tools of Garry's Mod. It, like Prop Hunt before it, is an excellent example of what Garry's Mod can provide creators, but they are really their own things now. Trouble in Terrorist Town and Prop Hunt are games, by definition. Garry's Mod is not.
It has, rightly, got a ton of attention and accolades for what it does. There's no denying that. But it's not a game. But there are a great many arguments that can be made that it is a must-play experience because what else is out there that does what Garry's Mod does? Minecraft? And even that's a push.
There are, so I read, many reasons to subscribe to user-generated content for Garry's Mod and get playing all manner of games, from RPGs to Mario-like platformers. If ever I want a Source-flavoured interpretation of Mario, I'll know where to go - but I don't think I want that.
Do I recommend you play around with Garry's Mod? Yeah, sure. It'll give you an appreciation for what game developers have to go through to get anything to work, that's for sure. Do I recommend it as a must-play? Eh, less so.
It's almost more of a platform than a game. You'll perhaps know more about what you can do with it, than the toolbox itself. Is there anything wrong with that? Not really. And it's not like this 1001 list will be able to account for everything anyway, so yeah, Garry's Mod deserves a spot here somewhere, and you deserve to mess around with it for a little bit.
And then see what game Steam recommends you play when you're finished with it.
Fun Facts
Garry Newman, the man behind the mod, now holds the view that the mod shouldn't have kept the name Garry's Mod upon becoming its own thing in 2006. He would have gone with Sandbox.
Garry's Mod, developed by Facepunch Studios, first released in 2004.
Version played: PC, 2006.