On Friday I attended the Big Day Out. I got there in the evening as I was there making the most of the free ticket deal, and found myself at the front of the crowd for Soundgarden (a band who I am not afraid to admit, I didn’t really know at all).
What has this got to do with Video Games you may ask? Well as my friend and myself were being pushed around by the excited crowd he yelled at me “THIS SONG WAS IN SAN ANDREAS!!” Mind. Blown.
In the midst of the loudness, and bright lights we started to yell about how GTA was one of our favourite games as children (!). I was transported back to my times playing GTA: San Andreas when it first came out. I think I would have been 13..
I then began to think about our lectures on violent video games, Jack Thompson, and censorship (thanks Summer School!)…
So you might ask, what is the appeal of GTA for a 13 year old girl? Well, it was a bonding experience for my cousins and myself. I didn’t have a PS2 or an Xbox, and they had both. I would go to their house afterschool and the four of us ranging from 12-19 would play (from memory) Halo, Midtown madness, and my favourite GTA:San Andreas.
My 19 year old cousin would have bought the games, and let us play them with him (which I will admit was a bit irresponsible), but we felt very grown up. He did censor some scenes from us (the sex scenes for example) and we never really did the missions, I think because he decided they weren’t really appropriate, but he certainly let us drive around and kill as many people as we liked. I think the appeal for me was about being able to explore such a vast setting, I loved driving around and finding random areas. It was a very entertaining play experience. As I got older, I would play San Andreas at friends houses, began to play missions and continued to find it entertaining.
Fast-forward back to the present. I am busy studying and working full time, and have never done anything remotely violent in my life. My eldest cousin has been in the police force for several years (oh, the irony), the next eldest works as a baker, and the youngest (the same age as me) works at the zoo and is hoping to be an animal trainer. I am not sure if you could find a selection of less violent professions and people in my life.
I am almost certain that this is in no way a unique story, for the majority of people the representational violence enacted in games like San Andreas stops there. I know a LOT of gamers, and can honestly say that there has never been a fight or any violence in my group of friends. As several people have already stated in this blog, it is just entertaining! If people like Jack Thompson actually stopped to talk to people who play these violent games he would probably realise that himself.
On a side note.. A nice little bit of satire from family guy:
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