[MeatwadGetsIt]

Blaming a game that reflects the society, is overlooking the root organized criminal outlawing of vice. Only organized crime benefits when liberties are removed to illegal status. When you create a black market gangland within your nation, expect to see crime running wild.

[RNR19952]

LOL good post

[kcnativnla]

This game just sold an estimated 9 MILLION units in one day. I'm sure Rockstar, Sony, Microsoft, and everyone involved could give a rat's backside about the mayor's complaints. In fact, they continue to break their own sales records BECAUSE "old people" complain.
Take a cue from 2 Live Crew; They disappeared from the charts ultimately because people stopped complaining long enough for the kids to realize that aside from the act of rebellion that listening to it represented, it actually wasn't good "music" anyway. GTA is an excellent game, but if they don't evolve, they'll fall by the wayside as well - as long as the old folks don't continue to give it free advertising.

[sproket]

Interestingly enough Grand Theft Auto IV teaches people (not kids, since kids aren't supposed to be playing this anyway) that driving drunk is a bad thing to do, and it does so in a safe environment where people can't get hurt.
I tried to drive drunk in the game one time. Guess what? Immediate wanted level cops after you instantly, you'll probably make it about 2 feet before you crash, or get arrested if you are drunk, resulting in loss of cash and immediate arrest. Driving drunk in GTA IV doesn't pay any more than it does in real life.
If anything the game teaches you that drunk driving is a really bad idea. But loser reactionary mouthpeice types who have never played the game will never know that. Sad.

[spiderwar]

its not about banning its about making these games hard to get for kids. maybe if a lot you twits would stop buying these games for or letting them play it, kids wouldnt be playing them. and yes these games DO desensitize kids. only and idiot would say they dont.

[Pause2Reflect]

Proportionally to miles driven by Americans there was more, a lot more, drunk driving 30 years ago. What games did we have then? Wake up and smell the complexities, folks.

[Pause2Reflect]

> these games DO desensitize kids.
> only and idiot would say they dont.
Really? I propose only an idiot would say they DO desensitize kids. That marvelous machine, the human brain, provides the ability to readily differentiate between the experience of a video game and the experience of reality. As far as they've come, video games don't remotely compare to the real dangers, and related fear, that reality provides. I have more faith in the mind than you do. Non-psychopathological children aren't lacking in the ability to distinguish real from high-def game-play. At least, I haven't met the kids that find them equally salient or compelling. Over a certain age, they understand that one has real consequences, the other doesn't. (Hence their oft-repeated, "it's just a GAME, Mom.")

[Flintster]

I find it hypocritical that the police are against the GTA series, they talk about the brutality that children can learn from this game. I have to point out that this game requires a game system and the game itself. Whereas television shows like COPS, DEA, SWAT show far more brutality and they are available to anyone. I have seen the police on there openly talk about killing another human being just because they merely felt threatened. Tell me what message this sends. On a recent DEA show I saw a DEA guy state in very animalistic terms that he had no problem killing anyone who was in the way, and I found it totally disgusting, but hey, the cops always get a pass on murder. Therefore, I say get your own house in order, maybe you are showing the kids the brutality they are reflecting back. Leave the adult video game industry alone.

[mcbarker]

Some of the most violent content available is shown on TV cartoons, a medium aimed directly at kids, and is basically, in some cases, extreme violence wrapped in a nice slapstick comedy package. Cartoons have been around since the 1930's, and I doubt very much that they have contributed to the corruption of the human psyche. My philosophy is, if video games make your kids do violent things, then both the kids and the parents need intense psychiatric help. People who don't want to be bothered with having to teach their kids to be good citizens shouldn't have kids... Period!

[gamedude]

Fine, you can make a game like that. The problem is that the industry says 17 , an R Movie, but it still markets and sells the game to kids.

Look at it this way, Toys R Us, a kid's toy store, doesn't sell R rated DVDs, but is happy to sell Grand Theft Auto 4.

That is the problem.

If you had kids, would you want them playing Grand Theft Auto 4?

[gamedude]

Toys R Us doesn't sell "No country for old men"

Toys R Us sells GTA

That is the problem.

[gamedude]

"What gets me is why are these groups, these politicians wasting valuable resources to attack video games and media in general. "

People don't want their kids playing them. The industry is doing nothing to stop these games from being sold and marketed to their kids.

Go ahead and make a game with guns, whores and killing cops... just don't sell it in a toy store. Seems reasonable to me.

[gamedude]

censorship ?

This is not about censorship.

With the internet it is very easy to make any game you want, and have it available to the world.

This is about money.

The industry has become addicted to GTA - which should be an adults only game - but refuses to make it one.

That is the problem.

Nothing is stopping them from making a game like this. The public is just pissed off that they are making it, and then instead of saying "this is a game for adults" they are marketing and selling it to kids.

What the industry should do, is to get the game out of toys r us, mark with adults only and figure out how to make a business that sells adult games to adults.

Intead they are too busy making millions from GTA to bother...

[kirbyj2]

Hey gamedude, you obviously have a problem with this game being available at a toy store. I agree, GTA shouldn't be sold in a kids toy store. Instead of bitching about the industry who makes the games, why don't you go bitch to the toy store for carrying the games. The responsibiltiy of keeping GTA out of kids hands doesn't fall on the game maker, it falls on the retail outlet that chooses to carry the game and the parents of the child.

I agree with most here, a video game hasn't every done crap to turn children, or anybody, violent. Unless they were already very mentally distrubed. I own previous iterations of GTA and my 9 year old daughter loves to play them with me. I know, I know, "OMG you let your 9 year old play GTA????" Yes I do, but before she ever got to play I sat down with her and discussed the content of the game. She knows that if she does't understand something that she can ask me and I'll explain it to her without candy-coating it. I see no need to shelter my children from reality. I cannot count the times that while my daughter was playing that she commented that some of hte actions in the gameplay are horrible and that she can't believe that any of it actually happens in real life.

My generation has a major problem, they need to get off their asses and take the responsibility of raising their children. And that means not sheltering them from reality. My parents sure didn't shelter me. How can you possibly learn right from wrong when you are never allowed to see what wrong is?

[gamedude]

kirbyj2

I just like to use toys r us as an example of the problem. Console games have been traditionaly more of a kids thing, and now the industry has made the games more realistic, more adult, but hasn't really changed the nature in how they are sold.

That is root of why people are complaining. If the industry would make these adult games, and sell them to adults, there would be less of a problem.

" video game hasn't every done crap to turn children, or anybody, violent. "

Nope, but it teaches them how to be violent. I firmly believe that all art influences and teaches people. I believe you can learn good and bad from all art, including video games. The thought that video games don't affect people good or bad, is silly. I learned a great deal about history from Civilization. I learned a great deal about close quarters combat from Quake.

"OMG you let your 9 year old play GTA????" Yes I do, but before she ever got to play I sat down with her and discussed the content of the game. "

But it is odd, why would you want her to play it? I mean, what is she going to get out of it. Entertainment? Information? Do you watch the sopranos with her too? Seems like there are better ways to entertain a 9 year old.

"They need to get off their asses and take the responsibility of raising their children. "

You don't understand why people are upset. If you make the decision to not have your kids play games like this, it is impossible. Because the billion dollar industry is marketing and selling these games for adults to your kids in every manner possible.

The industry can and should make adults only games, they just need to get them out of the toy stores and stop marketing them to kids.

[imkain]

The reason these organizations are complaining is to receive their free 15 minutes of fame. They don't get on their high horse when somebody else does these things: Police shooting in NY, kids who have wild parties while their parents are away (no one seems to blame the parents they blame society or the retailer who sold the beer to the parents), or when television shows display gratuitous violence no one seems to say anything there? So i find these groups hypcrites at best, and worse than the causes they are trying to support at worse. Unfortunately it's a morality choice...you either enjoy playing these games, or you despise that they were created in the first place, but there in lays the same issue with movies, TV, and radio. If you don't like it, don't play it. That's my opinion to most groups like that...and how bout we educate the parents to raise their children better instead of wasting valuable resources, time, and money over stuff they do not have control over when a simple education for these parents would be best.

[Evildave]

The local 'Game Stop' is attached to the local 'Blockbuster' video store. You can rent a DVD for $2 that is nothing but chainsaw murder, or you can buy a violent video game.

Mayhem games like 'Burnout' that are all about destroying every vehicle you can in ways that would make Al Qeda terrorists weep are A-OK, because you never see a human being. Of course, if you just caused half a dozen minivans to burst into flames, and you didn't see any people get out, it's pretty much guaranteed you just burned up whole families. Not a peep from the press.

In real life, I'm the most timid, cautious, infuriatingly patient driver. My 73 year old dad hates riding with me. Everybody does. I cruise below the speed limit all the time. I'm not in any hurry and I don't give a crap if you're a speed freak having an aneurysm behind me. I LIKE driving onto the sidewalk in GTA and getting a high wanted level, smashing up everything in sight.

If you have a problem with that, maybe you should have left earlier, you retarded tailgating putz. Of course, usually it's not even an appointment they're keen to drive 90 miles an hour through crowded streets to get to. They're just risking wholesale slaughter of randomly chosen REAL people all over the highway to go to the store for some drinks and chips. Where's the outcry about the casual slaughter of REAL people on REAL streets by REAL assholes? Heck, it barely merits mention on the local TV channels when it happens. "Fatal car crash kills five, the details would bore you, but now see how BRITNEY got a stain on her blouse!"

And that sort of sums up the real problem. People have their priorities completely fouled up. Got to protect your children from exposure to cursing and violence in video games, but not from movies or TV or yourself. Ignore the very real threat to their safety by driving like a junkie strung out on six different kinds of speed with them in the car without passenger restraints, and demonstrating to them the 'proper' way to try to drive when they get to be 16. Like rabid animals, barking curses at every passing car.

[gamedude]

It is silly to compare a violent movie to a violent video game.

The army may show you a film on squad based combat to have you learn about it.

But to train you how to do it, that they use simulators. That is how you are trained, with games.

Movies, books teach you stuff.

Games train you.

What you do with that training is up to you.

[jordanlund]

If you have a problem with the game appearing in Toys R Us then you need to address your complaint to the game buyer for that company.


It's not the fault of Take 2 or Rockstar or Sony or Microsoft that Toys R Us buys the game from their distributor.


You make it sound like the horrible game companies are forcing the innocent little toy store to carry their violent game and that's patently not the case. The game is on the shelves at Toys R Us because Toys R Us WANTS IT THERE.

There is nothing remotely similar between using a firearm and using a game controller (and I say that as a gun owner) so you can't say games teach you much of anything in that regard.

Grand Theft Auto is a third person game, does it teach you how to see your surroundings from 10 feet behind your own head as well?

The military uses games to teach tactics, yes, but the ability to use firearms requires real, physical training and access to real weapons.

[gamedude]

> The military uses games to teach tactics

Okay, that is what games train you in. Tactics.

I was just using it as example that games are far different from movies.