May 2, 2008 -
If you've experienced the "drunk driving" aspect of Grand Theft Auto IV, you know that it is pretty annoying. It makes it very difficult to control your ride.Beyond that, it's not a requirement. Nor is it a something that furthers your progress in any way.
But, as GamePolitics reported earlier this week, Mothers Against Drunk Driving have called for the ESRB to re-classify GTA IV as "Adults Only" based on the DUI feature.
Savannah, Georgia TV station WSAV-3 reports that the Traffic Commander of the Savannah-Chatham Police Department is also concerned. Lt. Scott Simpkins told WSAV:
How many people are going to go 'hey if I can master this, I can go out and instead of having a glass of wine or a beer with dinner, I can have 2 or 3 because I've been training how to drive intoxicated'? So these are the things that I have to worry about when stuff like this hits the market.
Comments
Re: Police Fret Over GTA IV's Drunk Driving
<sarcasm> COOL I just found out through my awesome new training device called GTAIV that I can go on a killing spree, ram into a bunch cars, and when I get bored I just my cell phone and dial 2675550100 and the police will no longer chase me. I'm off to try out how well my GTAIV training has taught me guys. </sarcasm>
surely if i do it in a game and think 'this is cool' (driving DUI, killing people whatever), and (allegedly by every critic) there is a complete lack of consequence, WHY OH WHY would i make the move to real life?
Apparently its 'SO REALISTIC' and 'HARD TO DISTINGUISH FROM REALITY', so to that end, WHY would i ever make th move to commiting the acts in reality.
I have a choice.. do it in a game, do it in real life.. both are Equally real (according to the critics) but one has a lack of consequences (acording to critics) and one has severe consequences.
So surely this game wouldnt in any way encourage people to do it in real life. They have a sand box where they can do it free from prosecution or actual harm.
They cant have it both ways.
People of GA: Please remember this in the next round of sheriff's elections and vote for the guy who 'worries about' about domestic violence, home-made drugs and high unemployment rates.
Now a video game is doing what these programs are already doing, but because it's a video game it's BAD instead of GOOD?
Jesus Mudder Fkn Christ. About as many people who think after flying the harrier in San Andreas that they could pilot a real vtol aircraft. Shoot this guy please for the sake of the gene pool.
Besides, driving drunk in GTAIV is a bad idea as the cops tend to get on your ass. That and you can't see/drive worth shit. So if anything it discourages you from drunk driving.
Master it? honestly. you cant hope to Master it. its random as hell
after completing Crackdown, I go
in to a "search mode" whenever
I hear a humming noise. Oh wait...
there it is again. I'll be back in a moment...
most of my acquaintances said they tried it once and won't again because of those ill effects.
Idiots.
Then again, he may just be a close-minded fool. Who knows for sure?
Ummm.... I'm thinking no one!
Then again, these criticisms are as always coming from people who don't play video games and don't understand how they work. It's foreign technology to them and they fear it.
um none
because gamers are the ones who know that video games cant train you to do jack shit.
I can also drive a car off a 10 storey building in gta, do a 360 flip bounce a coupe of ties, n then drive away.
Am i going to try that in real life.... gee.. what do you think
Arent they guilty of the same thing? And in the schools, no less!
Using the same twisted logic of the the police quote in this piece--if some high school kid finds that he can function in spite of wearing the drunk goggles, isnt that encoraging him to develop these 'skills' for real?
"You know how people $%*#ing hate us already?"
"Yeh, Sarge"
"Well.. we need more bad press. We need to give it 110%"
There is way too much misinformation being spread by those who don't understand and don't really seem to want to understand.
I think Yoda said it best:
"Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering."
J.T. is a "textbook" example of this.
-He fears something he knows little/nothing about.
-His lack of understanding has caused him to lash out at us and games.
-His actions have goaded us to do things that would normally be out of character for us (well, at least the vast majority of us) and has come to hate us and the games he does not understand.
-And as a result of all of this, it has caused him a fair (if not huge) amount of suffering, all of which is his own doing.
-From our perspective, it would seem that he has already gone "dark side" or is very close to doing so.
It all could have been avoided if he had the will to just do a little research. Of coarse there are many other factors at play: his obvious obsession with money, attention seeking, possible problems/trauma suffered during his upbringing, etc.
As being someone who picked himself up out of a bad downward spiral, it makes me sad to see other people who choose to live in fear, or are incapable of doing otherwise.
I have this overpowering instinct to help him, and others like him, aquire a life where they do not live in fear and achieve a state of inner-peace, but the catch is they have to want it. It appears most of them do not.
I am saddened . . .
I wonder if I could get Thompson to represent me. He's all about using games for training...
I've played Burnout Paradise, i guess that means I'm trained to drive 100+ miles per hour, run people into walls, and take my car off some sweet jumps. Yay!
It seems that this guy can't tell the difference between a video game and real life. You can't train to do things in this game. Anyone who thinks you can learn to drive, shoot, have sex, be drunk,etc, is the one out of touch with reality.
- Warren Lewis
Um...none?
OK, shooting rampages are one thing, but are they SERIOUSLY going to try to pin drunk-driving on GTA!? What kind of crap is that? Its like no one is acknowledging the fact that people got behind the wheel intoxicated pre-GTA release...
In real life, drunk driving has reactions delayed and this causes devastating results because of how much ground one can cover in a vehicle before reacting to a stimuli. This is what results in accidents. Lt Scott is an idiot, especially since people can simply enjoy a silly practice in a virtual reality game, where no actual victims will result in it, as opposed to them wanting to try it in actuality.
I really wish people would do some research before saying such stupid things. Buy the game, see how hard it is to drive drunk, see how fast you get pulled over, and then talk about it "trains" you to drive drunk...
Oh, and since when did the driving in GTA become a simulator?
So if I happen to play a female character in a game, does that mean I'm "training" for a sex change? (That /is/ a rhetorical question, just so you know...)
The thing you need to know is that... who is actually THAT impressionable from a video game, regardless of whether they're between the ages of 16-21 or 21-30?
Oh, wait a minute.... that didn't happen. Maybe becausemost gamers know the difference between a game and the real world.
..But damn I hate ignorant people.