I have a question related to the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.
Was watching the news yesterday, and someone was squawking about the violent video games, ho hum, wonder what’s on channel four, right?
Well, even I had to admit some of the current crop are pretty extreme. In particular, there was one game – GTA: Vice City – where, (the news claimed) you gain points for having sex with a prostitute and then kicking her to death.
What I wanna know is: Is this true? Is there a section in the game like this?
… or is it all alarmist crap, or is the section of the game shown being taken out of context, or what?
Well, yeah… in the GTA games, you can pretty much kill ANYONE… but the article specifically said that you got points for kicking the hooker to death after you had sex with them.
I got this weird mental image of some DOOM-like game where you ran around a labyrinth, shooting enemies… but when you saw a hooker, you’d hit a different key or something, and leap on her, and…
If you pull up to a prostitute in a fancy car, she’ll get in and then you can drive to a secluded area, where the car will shake and you’ll gain health. Then she’ll get out, taking some of your money, and walk away. You can then chase her down and run her over with your automobile, or chase her on foot and kill her with any weapons you have (including your fists and feet.) If you do this you can get your money back, but it’s not really very much and there’s no other benefit to doing so.
In GTA: 3 You can proposition prostitutes to get into your car, and if it is the right make, the car will bounce while your “health” goes up and your money goes down. After the transaction, the prostitute gets out of the car, and you can, of course, kill her and take her money.
I don’t know about GTA: VC, but considering that it came out after GTA: 3, it’s a good bet that the pros have the same behavior.
A game my younger brother described getting recently (Hitman, if I remember correctly) encourages you to creep around killing people without provocation.
But the all time worst is actually intended to be one of the most innocuous, The Sims. Mass murderers can add to their own private graveyards through electrocution, starvation, or the infamous inferno room. I won’t even mention the nudity patch that causes not only the adults (which isn’t so bad, all things considered) but also the children to wander the neighborhood buck naked.
The commericial I saw about this on the news yesterday has you fighting a cop in gta vc who has a baton, then he falls down & you kick him again & again. This is actually an early mission.
Yes, in GTA, you can steal a cop car, run over people, shoot everyone one want including firemen and cops, pick up hookers, hit people with baseball bats.
My recommendation? If you really want to know what GTA is like, rent a PS2, rent GTA, and form your own opinion about it. The game is for adults, just like R-rated movies are for adults.
The game already has an M rating on the box. If you’re worried about your kids playing it, then don’t buy it for them. Just like you should monitor what they watch on TV, you monitor what games they play.
Hitman killing people indescriminately? Your brother’s playing this game the wrong way.
I’m just kidding here, I realize that once you have the game you can play it however you see fit. But in Hitman, only the targets and bodyguards are fair game. You get penalized for killing anybody else. Also, the “target” is always a bad guy (drug lord, mafia don, international terrorist, etc.), so the game isn’t a “kill random people for fun and profit” simulator.
But yes, all the GTAs and this game present death in a lighthearted fashion - someone’s in the way, a few shots wil remove them without another thought. This makes it necessary for the person playing it to have a firm idea of consequences of actions and a seperation of fantasy and reality. Someone mature, in other words.
You can beat up or kill any random person in the game - cop, hooker, whatever - and you may get some money (which you supposedly took from their pockets although it doesn’t show this). Hookers generally do have more cash on them than other people. Many people have little or no money, so its not necessarily an efficient way of getting money. You don’t get any points (it’s really not a score-oriented game anyway).
I haven’t gotten all the way through the game, but I haven’t encountered any missions where you have to kill a hooker or a cop. You may have to resist arrest, and hitting/shooting back at the cops may be easier than running and hiding.
I have heard of people trying to play the game as a “good guy”, by not hurting anyone that you are not required to. That would make the game a lot harder though.
(I’ve played GTA:VC)
I’m a little bothered by the hype about killing hookers, and the charge that this game is somehow anti-female.
Truth is, in the game, you can kill anybody, man, woman, old lady, cop, whatever (there are no children in the game, or animals). And, as I remember, there’s only one mission where a female is specificaly a target (“waste the wife” - anybody know of another?).
Where’s the outrage over the chainsaw-up-the-man’s-gut? Don’t males count for anything?
There is another mission where you have to steal something a buisness syndicate or somehing simlair, all the ‘gang’ members in that mission are female and you have to kill at least some of them.
You can DO em in GTA VC’s predecessor so you should be able to do em in gta vc
to do one - get a good car, and park on the road next to one. if she’s impressed by the car she’ll get in. take her to a back alley, and watch as the windows steam up and the car shakes.
I had wondered about “points”. Was GTA a point-oriented game? Most shooters out these days aren’t.
You gain health by porking hookers? Geez. That’s the exact opposite of what Coach Uberschmidt taught me back in Health class in grade school…
In Hitman, you don’t shoot anyone indiscriminately; that costs you. You’re a HITMAN, not a lunatic.
GTA, I’ve never played… but it sound like you CAN be a lunatic in THAT one…
Been playing The Sims for years. Yes, you can build your own private graveyard, but it’s not easy, and not particularly fun, unless you’re the kind of person who enjoys pulling the wings off flies. I felt it was easier and less nervewracking just to go to 7deadlysims.com and download the tombstones for decoration purposes…
You don’t HAVE to beat people up in the game. If you do beat someone up - you are the type of person who wants to pretend-beat-someone-up.
Is it ok to argue that violent games are a good thing? - They give you the oportunity to do things that you would never dream of doing in real life
World without GTA3
Day 1 - OHHH I could really beat someone up right now.
Day 2 - OHHHH I could really really beat someone up right now.
Day 3 - <beats someone up>
World with GTA3
Day 1 - OHHH I could really beat someone up right now.
Plays GTA 3 and beats someone up.
Day 2 - Funny, I don’t feel like beating anyone up.
I know that’s a lame argument. but the point is there somewhere.
I feel the need to add to this in order to fill-in those who haven’t played GTA. There are consequences in the game. If you shoot people or even get into a fender-bender with a police car, the cops will come after you. The more people you kill and the more reckless you are, the more cops come after you. It works on a 6-star system. No stars, and everything is calm.
Do something to earn one star and the police chase you and beat you up and possibly arrest you. They will actually jack you right out of your car if your not careful. After a while, if the police are unsuccessful, the star will go away and so will the police.
If you do enough killing to get 2-stars, the police chase you with more intensity, will ram you with their cars or shoot at you with their pistols.
3-stars is where it starts to get exciting. Reach this level and the cops increase even more in intensity and they call out a police helicopter to come after you and fire at you from the air. The FBI also shows up in fast cars, with UZI type weapons.
4-stars will get the swat team on you, and they have automatic rifles with much more accuracy than the cops and FBI. Helicopters now have swat teams roping down to the ground in your vicinity.
5-stars and all the various LEO’s increase in intensity, in numbers, and they get better vehicles.
6-stars and all hell breaks loose when the National Guard arrives in great numbers in tanks and big trucks with superior firepower. I can’t figure out why the tanks never fire at you though…
So, as you can see, GTA does have in-game consequences for your in-game actions. It’s not just a splatter-fest…Well, I guess it is, but YOU get splattered too.
I’ve played many games back since I had a ColecoVision, TI-99/4a, C-64, PC, various modern consoles up to the PS2, and I have never played a game that I liked more than GTA. I consider it both "the best game EVER"tm and a work of art.
I don’t have kids, but if I did, I wouldn’t even let them watch ME play it. Video games are not just for kids anymore.
99.9999% of the people who play violent video games know the difference between fantasy and reality. These people get relief from their stress and frustration by releasing it in a setting where there are no real-world consequences to their actions.