Introduction
Imaginary worlds created by the movie and game industry are fascinating. Modern technologies allow creating masterpieces of science fiction, fantasy, historical movies, and others as well as real video games that can give much more than movies can. Video games are interactive; they provide a gamer with an opportunity to interact with the environment in various ways. Some games provide total freedom of actions, including minimal or no punishments for breaking social norms accepted in society. In other words, gamers can hunt and kill, rob and torture imaginary people without any restrictions. The Grand Theft Auto series is among such products of the gaming industry. The latest game in the series, Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V) (Rockstar Games) is the example of the video game, providing the opportunity to behave in such a manner and indirectly promoting it. Modern video games can pose a threat to society by providing gamers with a feeling of overindulgence.
Summary
It is the story of three different people that unite to pursue their dream. Michael De Santa is a middle-aged retired bank robber who has serious issues with the family relationship and dark history. Franklin Clinton is an African-American man, a potential gang member who wants to achieve success in life by any means but being a good person, though. Finally, Trevor Phillips is a redneck with mental issues and a former partner of Michael in the bank robbing business.
The story makes a gamer live a part of the life of each character and does it rather exquisitely (Miller and Paola). It is an open world with missions that each character or a group of them must finish to proceed through the storyline until the end. The story itself is a cliché about the old friends who have become enemies and then become friends again. Through the storyline and beyond it Michael, Franklin, and Trevor rob people, kill people, destroy the property of people, and go free in the end.
Evaluation
It should be noted that playing GTA V is interesting. Moreover, the fact that the world of the game is open makes it even more attractive. The game provides the opportunity to do almost anything and most of this ‘anything’ in unreachable for the regular people. Aside from fancy life, a gamer can steal any means of transportation and drive, fly, and dive wherever possible in the game. GTA V has excellent graphics, so the game environment looks astonishingly real. Another key to success in attracting gamers is the live environment. The virtual people in GTA V drive to work and back home every day, socialize in strip clubs, sunbathe at the numerous beaches, entertain, and just walk the streets.
Police cars patrol, aircraft take off and land at the local airport, and hundreds of other things happen that are not related to the characters’ activities. In some situations, even robberies on the streets can be noticed. The freedom of action is not full, of course. Any of the main characters cannot get a job somewhere in the city or outside it and live such a life. It would take too many resources to program such an environment, and it is not the task of the game. The idea was to provide gamers with an environment that could be used for actions that a regular person could not do in real life. GTA V allows gamers to kill, crush, and destroy without being punished.
Critique
The problem of the game is the feeling of overindulgence it provides in full. A gamer can kill anyone in the game, ride a few miles on the highway running away from police, and that is it. They lose interest in the situation, and the same can be done again. It is possible to beat someone to death, and nothing will happen. Maybe, police will show after a while. It would not be that noticeable if it were some military-focused game. However, GTA is the game that imitates the real world, so it has to provide the same understanding of social norms as in the real world. It does not happen, though. Such a state of things can make some people act irrationally in real-life too. Considering it, the game makers should be more careful with their products and implement adequate procedures of punishment in the future products.
Conclusion
Modern video games can be dangerous to society. The paper has critically evaluated one of the recently released video games Grand Theft Auto V to conclude that this game is an example of the irresponsible attitude of the authors to the social consequences it can provoke. The paper is full of violence, so it should not be given to children of all ages. It requires careful attention of the gamers who wants to feel the total freedom of actions, including full law disobedience because it can be dangerous in real life.
Works Cited
Miller, Brenda, and Suzanne Paola. Tell it Slant: Writing and Shaping Creative Nonfiction. New York: McGraw Hill Professional, 2004. Print.
Rockstar Games. Grand Theft Auto V, ver. 1.0.0. New York: Rockstar Games, 2013. Computer program.