Tuesday 26 July, 2011

When I did play Grand Theft Auto games back in the day (rarely as it was), I never saw any implications or quandaries with the game itself. Sure, I would take a car, run it into a shop and shoot up the place, but at the end, when I stopped playing the game I put the controller down and that was that, back to real life. Although, I was in 8th grade at the time…
As the years passed, the game received more and more abuse and insults than any other game, and I started to realize how much racial content there really was in the game. However, this doesn’t change my opinion, its still a game after all.
I’ll kick this off by saying what I think about the game a little. The game takes place in San Andreas in California and some Nevada a most proper place for the protagonist. The main character is named Carl Johnson, a gang member that blends in perfect for the crime in the city. The first thing I started doing when I got to playing was not as much the storyline, but hijacking a car and getting some money for new weapons. However, I quickly found trouble when I went into an area were I was obviously not welcomed, getting shot at and chased by other cars that were pimped out. These actions pretty well took up most of my 30 minutes very quickly, I just couldn’t stop driving my car as fast as I could over jumps and shooting pedestrians down.
To conclude session I of San Andreas, I have defiantly taken the position that Gee describes in his writings, seeing me as Carl Johnson. Thus far, the racial content is pretty apparent and brutal. I’ve gone around beating up different people from other origins multiple times, and they always come back for more, or did I run the over with my car…

"To conclude session I of San Andreas, I have defiantly taken the position that Gee describes in his writings, seeing me as Carl Johnson. Thus far, the racial content is pretty apparent and brutal. "

Do you think that Carl is a bad person (and that he enjoys being violent and criminal?) From Gee's perspective, this would matter, no? What do we know about CJ from the storyline and missions?