Grand Theft Apologist

Bought Grand Theft Auto IV last week after an impressive string of perfect reviews popped up on Metacritic. Ah, who am I kidding? I'd have bought that game no matter what the reviews said. Enjoying it so far, except that they made driving too realistic (it's now difficult to pull off 90 degree turns at full speed without doing a few inadvertent donuts). Also, I don't seem to have the attention span for just screwing around with the game world like I used to, which is too bad because it's a doozy of a game world. But enough pseudo-review. Instead, I thought it'd be fun to be the nine billionth person to weigh in on the moral implications behind the game.

It's true that you can do some horrifying stuff in GTA without serious repercussions. Anybody looking for a misogynistic streak in the game isn't going to have to look very hard, and any watchdog organizations searching for something to offend them are going to strike gold early and repeatedly. It's a pretty hard game to defend; you can call it satire, you can argue that the scenes of the protagonist shooting cops are taken out of context, you can claim that some of the most morally repugnant actions available aren't necessary or even encouraged by the game itself. But that doesn't change the fact that this is a game where you can kill policemen and beat up hookers. I almost wish people would stop trying to defend the game at all; I'm certainly tired of trying.

It seems like a generational thing; the generation currently running the mainstream media, the one in charge of being outraged over things, sees video games as an activity exclusively for kids. To them, GTA is the equivalent of some network showing hardcore porn as part of its Saturday morning cartoon lineup. Video game publishers can stamp "Not for kids!!!!" all over their game boxes in size bazillion font and it won't matter, because the "games are for kids" mindset is too deeply ingrained. It won't get any better until a younger generation, one that grew up with video games and sees them as a form of entertainment that needs to be filtered for children like music and movies, takes over the controls of the Outrage Machine.

In the meantime, I'm going to keep playing GTA, and I refuse to feel bad about it. It's a great way to blow off steam and relieve stress. It's got an interesting story that will take me as long to complete as a 1,000 page novel, and will hopefully be as rewarding.

Bonus Unsolicited Media Thoughts!

• Go see Iron Man. It's the best comic book movie since the X2 (don't even bring up Batman Begins; Katie Holmes was awful and the Batmobile redesign should have resulted in criminal charges). I'm developing a man-crush on Robert Downey.


• I can't think of a single movie that I want to see less than the new Mike Myers... thing being previewed right now. I told my wife I'd rather pay money to see the Sisterhood of Traveling Pants sequel, and I was completely serious.


• Wanted is probably going to suck, but I'm still excited to see it.