The Interview Controversy Sheds Troubling Light On Video Game Acceptance

When both of these incidents took place, there was controversy. Debate ensued with two sides each offering up different points and demanding equal validity. But Sony has been met with almost universal admonishment after pulling The Interview. A quick search of The Interview mentions on Twitter reveals a starkly one-sided picture. A tweet by Judd Apatow (long-time associate of Rogen's) calling the move by Sony "disgraceful" was retweeted more than 5 thousand times in 11 hours.

It baffles me as to why Rockstar would even consider a first-person mode for GTA V. Perhaps it was the success of open-world shooters like Far Cry 3 that inspired them to do read this blog post from Gta 5play, which is understandable. However, Far Cry 3 is a shooter. It’s built as a shooter and the shooting is a huge part of the game’s appeal. Sure, there’s exploration, but the action is Far Cry’s appeal by far. Grand Theft Auto V, for all its gritty action and violence, is not a shooter. Its action comes from something less primal and more intelligent. If anything, this first-person shooter setup does more to pander to the FPS crowd than to thoughtfully expand on what Grand Theft Auto has always been about.


Along with a stock market where players can go from rags to riches, Strangers and Freaks side missions, and the general multiplayer gameplay of GTA Online , players have rarely been stuck with nothing to do. Yet with so many GTA V players having completed the game's story mode, fans are still asking if Rockstar will add more single player content into the g


Popular video game **Grand Theft Auto V ** could be making its way to Nintendo Switch . The action-adventure video game developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games has garnered a cult following, ramping up the success that the franchise has been enjoying since it was first released in 2008. The latest iteration in the game series, which was rolled-out in 2013, takes players to the fictional location of Los Santos, San Andreas state of San Andreas, where every gamer can live out their best (or worst) thieving dre

The content of these games shouldn't matter. The greater principle at stake here is the idea that people should be free to express their ideas, a value clearly held dearly by movie-goers but not so much by the gaming community. Society has spoken about movies: we want any film, regardless of how controversial the subject matter, to be available to the public in an exercise of our right to free speech and ideal of free expression. The question remains when, if ever, will society feel the same way about video games?

Tweets about Hatred are much more skewed, and conversation about GTA V, much discussed in the video game press, seems to paint a two-sided issues. Defense of Target's decision as not censorship and a positive step toward equality were just as rampant, if not more so, than concerns over the kind of precedent their move set. Consider this, if it's not censorship for Target to pull the game, what if all retailers pulled the game? It's well within their rights, but it would achieve the exact same effect as a blatant censorship did. Thus, a de facto censorship - a universal lack of availability that's not necessarily enforced by law.

But saying that this dimension is "a game-changer" is overzealous. The first-person perspective in Grand Theft Auto V constantly evokes an aura of novelty. It doesn’t fit in. Grand Theft Auto V, and the Grand Theft Auto series in general, was never built for first-person. Many of the actions benefit from a more peripheral viewpoint, as you can attackers easier and see a nearby getaway vehicle without fiddling around with the camera too much. Firefights are not the focus of GTA, nor are the driving segments. Grand Theft Auto’s appeal has always been the open-world. Moving around a city, launching off a ramp, shooting enemies, and making a clean getaway are not that valuable on their own, but the cohesion between these elements is what make GTA into what it is. The first-person perspective disjoints that synergy; it frames the firefights and vehicles as the most core elements, when they’ve only been pieces of a bigger puzzle.

The moments of awe that the first-person mode demonstrate (like the flying segments) are constantly overshadowed by an obstructive and pointless statement. As the fanmade mods have shown us, first-person GTA is a novelty, a fleeting distraction that you’ll use for five minutes, then realize that it was just better the old way. Re-releasing GTA V barely a year after release is already a questionable move, but using something so disposable and out of place as a selling point is the real issue at hand. And yes, it’s optional. I understand that, but why treat this as a game-changer? GTA V on PS4 and Xbox One will sell, likely very well, but not because of the first-person mode. GTA V’s first-person mode is a pointless addition that does more to shamelessly lure in FPS fans than deliver any substantial inclusions to what Grand Theft Auto is about.