Sunday, May 4, 2008
Grand Theft Auto Controversies... Of Course?
In this first article, Glenn Beck from CNN claims that GTA 4 is training people to kill. He uses the phrase, "this is entertainment?" I agree with him. The game consists of mindless murder for pleasure. The funnier the way you kill people, the more entertaining the game is. I was watching my buddy play and I kid you not: he picked up a hooker, had sex with her, and then killed her and took her money. Wow... HOWEVER, the ironic part is, I own the game. Just bought it this weekend and literally have not stopped playing. Isn't that strange? I think the game is terrible for our society and its destroying young kids' minds, yet I bought the game and gave my money straight to Rockstar. Its totally addicting. I will say though, along with the millions of others who have already purchased the game, I feel NO desire to kill anyone in real life.. I don't feel like I am "trained to kill" and I know that I will never want to kill anyone. In this next article, the Vice-president of Rockstar Games (maker of the GTA series) makes an excellent point. He says, "But if we don't like these games because they've got content that we're happy to see in movies and TV shows, then what you're saying is you don't like the medium because we don't have a George Clooney type sticking his face in front of the camera." He says that we get all the same content in these games that we get in movies. He thinks that there is really no difference.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Readers of the online comic Penny-Arcade should be pretty familiar with this. They set up a charity in response to an article not unlike that above, and have since donated over two-million dollars to children's hospitals around the globe.
"If you are like me, every time you see an article like this one, where the author claims that video games are training our nations youth to kill you get angry. The media seems intent on perpetuating the myth that gamers are ticking time bombs just waiting to go off. I know for a fact that gamers are good people. I have had the opportunity on multiple occasions to meet hundreds of you at conventions all over the country. We are just regular people who happen to love video games." (See Child's Play Charity)
I heard a podcast this week that discussed the culture impacts of GTA IV with a NPR journalist. Definitely worth checking out if your interested in the controversy.
Link
Today my husband sold off all of his XBox games, so I spent some quality time at the Buy Back Games store with him. I was amazed at the variety of games available - why do we need such violent, realistic games? I understand that there's a place for the fantasy/fictional violence, but I just don't get the appeal of GTA... the whole premise just seems very distasteful to me.
Post a Comment