Nintendo Okie

I’ve never played any of the GTA games.  I’ve never had a desire to play them.  I’ve also talked about where I stand on the subject of violence in video games.  Rockstar has come out and said that their games are for adults.  This quote comes from Lazlow Jones of Rockstar Games while talking to Computer and Video Games:

“Our games are not designed for young people. If you’re a parent and buy one of our games for your child you’re a terrible parent. We design games for adults because we’re adults. There’s a lot of kids games out there that we’re not interested in playing. Just like you enjoy watching movies and TV shows with adult themes and language and violence that’s the kind of thing we seek to produce. I think that Rockstar has pushed a lot of boundaries to be able to make the art that that we believe we should be able to make. If you tell a gritty crime drama with violence and profanity and call it The Sopranos you’re handed a load of awards to put up on the shelf. You do the same and call it a video game and you’ll have certain organisations up in arms. I think ever since GTA IV came out and there were such rave reviews by major publications saying that this is actually art the restrictions about being politically correct have largely fallen away.”

That initial statement right there sums up many of the problems that can be attributed to violence in video games.  There is a bit of a double standard when it comes to this industry.  I don’t think kids should be playing games outside of their basic age range.  There are a few exceptions and ultimately it’s up to parents to decide what is right for their kids.  There are some games that I think no kid should be playing no matter how old they are, until they’re 17 years old.  Rockstar’s games fall into that category. 

It’s just nice to finally see one of these developers say that.