Playing Grand Theft Auto V in first-person mode is an often unsettling experience. There was a certain level of voyeurism in play when I watched my player-character wreak havoc in the game’s open-world in third-person, even though I was always directly in control of their actions. However, when I are placed in their shoes in the newly released current-gen remastered edition of the game, my somewhat blasé attitude towards its over-the-top violence gave way to a sense of discomfort.
Sex Over Violence?
Earlier this week I predicted that the introduction of GTAV‘s first-person mode was likely to stir up controversy, due to the game’s already inherently violent nature being inarguably amplified by the new viewpoint. Thus far the only topic for debate that has been latched onto by the mainstream media has concerned the game’s new first-person sex scenes, as players can now pay a prostitute and watch the action in a more up close and personal manner – there’s no nudity involved in these scenes at all, though the mere implication of sex has inevitably seen newspapers such as the Daily Mail throw their arms up in the air with disgust.
This is coming from a paper whose website, Mail Online, features a litany of articles devoted to nipslips, female celebrities photographed in their bikinis whilst enjoying themselves on holiday, and other such “news” items that make two CGI characters doing the no-pants-dance in a video game seem tame by comparison.
I mean, everyone’s watched porn, right? The writers of the Daily Mail certainly must have done, given that the content they post seems to have been written by men with perma-erections. The first-person pseudo-sex scenes in GTAV are certainly crude (and something of a first for a triple-A video game), though that being the subject of debate rather than the player running up to innocent pedestrians and graphically mauling them with a knife is more than a little odd, especially when the violence on display is so disconcerting.
I play [violent] video games almost daily, and I’m almost certain they have not done any damage to my state of mind.
Though sex in GTAV is the current hot topic, I would wager that the first-person maulings it allows players to embark upon will soon find its way into the spotlight, and honestly, I wouldn’t blame those who turn their noses up at the game. After playing video games my whole life and witnessing the industry transition from brightly colored platformers to “mature” titles focused upon war, death and every grim thing in between, I have developed a high level of tolerance and considerable lack of squeamishness when it comes to seeing violence in the medium.
I play video games almost daily, with most of those video games contain considerable amounts of blood, and I am almost certainly sure they have not done any damage to my state of mind. With that being said, playing GTAV in first-person and killing innocents with this new viewpoint caused me to feel something in regards to the violence I was committing.
I felt bad… because I was having a good time.
Equal Opportunities Bloodshed
Now more than ever there are frequent discussions regarding the morality of video game narratives. Everything from Call of Duty‘s pro-war campaigns to God of War‘s sexism, critics and consumers alike frequently work themselves up into a tizzy regarding the potentially damaging themes exhibited in the medium. Grand Theft Auto V, of course, is no exception.
Prior to its previous release on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 there was a backlash against reviewers who were (quite rightly) pointing out some of the game’s troubling themes, mainly its all-too-frequent bouts of misogyny.
While the male characters are scumbags, they’re still scumbags in control while the women have no power at all.
Back during its initial release I stood firmly within the camp of those who believed that the game portrayed all of the inhabitants of its world in a negative light, therefore the way its female characters were written into its story was really no different to how Rockstar’s writers handled protagonists Trevor, Michael and Franklin.
With the benefit of hindsight I would now retract my opinion, as it’s clear that in GTAV it is very much a man’s world. While the male characters are still scumbags, they’re scumbags in control, with women having little to no power over the goings on in the game’s world. While many would say that the violence in GTAV serves to make the game morally bankrupt, I would argue that it is at least “equal opportunities” violence, in that no one in the world is safe from harm when it comes to your bullets. And I enjoy it. I’ve always enjoyed causing mayhem and wantonly dealing out violence in this virtual world, but with the addition of the first-person viewpoint,
indulging in it now makes me feel like a bit of a psychopath.
I’m Not a Psychopath. I Promise.
I could try to justify why I enjoy the first-person violence in GTAV, but in truth there is no need to. GTAV is an entertainment product, and while there are many completely accurate arguments that can be made as to why it’s a troubling piece of media, there’s little denying that it is entertaining.
Playing it doesn’t allow me to exercise some deep-rooted sociopathic tendencies, nor does it convince me that going around shooting people is a good idea. It’s just good fun. Hopping in a car and watching NPC’s ragdoll bodies fly over my bonnet? Fun. Holding up a gas station with my friends? Fun. Hopping into a fighter jet and firing missiles onto the packed roads below me? Double fun.
As someone with very liberal sensibilities (I hear we call these people “Social Justice Warriors” now), there is a lot of things about GTAV that don’t align with my own moral compass – but not every piece of entertainment has to do that. Not every video game I play needs to righteously vindicate my own personal views for me glean enjoyment out of it, and the hours I’ve spent being a truly loathsome, villainous son-of-a-gun in GTAV is testament to this.
I wouldn’t want to play the game while in the company of my mother, but I have one helluva time playing it in the privacy of my own home.
