Sunday 5 October, 2008

Despite my rant on gameplay in the last entry, I’m only one person and the majority of the gaming world obviously doesn’t feel the way I do on the less than great gameplay layout. Taking a look at the ethical choices one has to make: should I or should I not steal this car?, If I kill this person, I’ll get respect points but I’ll also run the risk of getting killed by his gang—what to do? The list goes on. The game leaves no other option for you that is plausible besides violence. I mean, sure I could walk to my next mission and burn out all my stamina, but why do that when there’s plenty of hijackable cars being driven down the road? I could outrun the police and hide until they leave me alone, but then what would be the use of this pistol I’m carrying? GTA forces the player into a mindset to cater to our inner criminal mafia personality.

Within ten minutes of gameplay I found myself absorbed in the story and having to think like a criminal to get what I wanted. In the real world I’d never hijack a car, and when I sat down to play the game it didn’t occur to me at first to do so. I was given a mission and a map and that was all. I half-expected to be given another bike and as I/Carl started walking I noticed all the cars flying past me. “Hey, this is GTA, what am I walking for?” I thought. I stood next to the nearest driver door, engaged in a brief bout of button mashing and I was soon the new owner of a stolen vehicle.

I’ve heard the occasional news story of someone killing another in real life claiming the crime was inspired by GTA, and I don’t doubt it. This is the kind of game that gives video games a bad name. Parents and politicians are in arms over games like this, where the main reason to play is to kill and commit crime and do drugs, etc. I don’t blame them, I wouldn’t want my ten or fourteen year old playing this. I felt more annoyed and violent only after playing for an hour. Even if I didn’t notice the effects of the violence immediately, I think those images and feelings would stay with me whether I realized it or not and possibly manifest themselves in other ways. I don’t think that these types of GTA/M-rated games should be made illegal, but I also thing the access to the public should be really limited. By that I mean there should be tighter laws that would prevent kids from getting GTA; ‘should’ being the operative word—the chances of tougher laws realistically being put into effect are small. Ultimately I think the responsibility lies with the concerned parents to be techno-savvy and learn to monitor what their children play.

Overall, do you think that games make people violent or do violent people imitate the images they see in games? You said that you became irritable after playing, this proves that games do set the mood of people who play them. I myself play FPS online and people become very hostile and anti social towards opponents. Maybe this is because the nature of violent competition, it accesses our more aggressive nature.