The GTA V Reviews Compilation & Discussion Thread

Maybe out of place is the wrong way to put it. Badly written may be better. Her chanting "Vulva, vulva, vulva" just seemed dumb

Wow, I didn't think that so many people would react as they have on GS... probably mostly babbling teenagers but still.

I think Darji likes it because it parodies a thing he so vehemently despises. If she was flipped and was parodying a men's rights activist, he'd be calling Rockstar a part of the "PC MOB" or some nonsense. I don't care either way. The sexism debate needs to stop being brought into every topic on this site.

I just read the Gamespot review. I'll have to play it myself to see if those things bother me or not. On the one hand, they are emulating the real world where sexism is very real so not having it there would be odd. These games are satirical and so everything, including sexism, should be fair game. But if they glorify sexism and don't have any recourse, either for those actions or for those characters, then I might have a problem with it. But at the sane time if they glorify crime with no recourse I'd have a problem with that too.

@rowr: Again, she gave the game a 9/10. You make it sound like she hated it. If her perspective isn't interesting to you, that's fine but her review really isn't much of a outlier from every other review published today. The core of the review is still "this game is really fucking good."

I'm guessing you mean the characters are racist?

There's a difference between the characters being racist and the game being racist.

You are a massive tool.

Oh hey look...the game got really high marks...and people thought I was crazy for thinking that for some reason, as if it weren't a given. Go figure.

You are a massive tool.

Sounds like that steakhouse loves women.

@punkxblaze: Logged in after reading this post just for the sole purpose of telling you I really appreciated reading it.

It might not be the be-all, end-all opinion on the subject. Hell, you'll be lucky to have most in this thread agree with you on each tenet. But at least there's a little bit of even-handed reason still around.

The Verge

No Score

"A wild ride through a crazy world"

"I wanted to see what would happen to Trevor, Michael, and Franklin more than I wanted to try jumping a motorcycle onto a moving train — and I really wanted to trying landing that jump."

I don't give a damn about scores. For any game. So griping on that seems silly.

I'm just glad I finally won the round of "Social Justice issue of the day for Game Critics" bingo.

I wonder if it would be possible to somehow gather statistics about what proportion of people buying GTA are female. Would be interesting to know.

And it's also interesting how similar types of people that praise creative control go apeshit when they don't agree with someone's creation.

No the generalization of these characters are very racist. Not the protagonists but a lot of side characters. They are stereotypical and and extreme in that and That is why his aunt also fits perfectly into all this. You have these stereotypical politician you have these feminists, you have these black people. Michael's family are a bunch of assholes, There are tons of rednecks and so on. So why is a parody of a feminist out of place?

Ctrl + F: 31 hits for misogny over 160 posts.

A word meaning an outright hatred of women.

Male chauvinism might be a better term to use. But we're going to get more of a reaction by being extremist in both opinion and exaggeration, right? It's getting to the point where I can barely go online to discuss video games, because everyone is too busy arguing with the mentality of school children.

She didn't go apeshit. She critiqued it as is her right and still loved the game even though it slightly detracted from her experience.

She didn't go apeshit. She critiqued it as is her right and still loved the game even though it slightly detracted from her experience.

Sorry guys. Games aren't allowed to have male leads anymore. If they do? Sexist. If a woman is kidnapped? Sexist. If a woman shows a hint of skin? Sexist. Fuck off.

Goddamit.

Americans really need to be taught in school or something how racism works. All this misogny stuff is basically the same misinterpretation.

Isn't school in session right now? Why are you here?

It depends on how you structure it and how things are played out. Funny Games isn't a worse movie because the two guys are evil and don't have an ulterior motive besides being evil. And I, as a viewer, am definitely not connecting with them, but still, the quality of the movie doesn't decreased based on that.

Who are you even talking to?

First of all I am not american. Secondly I know how this works and I totally agree with you but if people think this is misogynistic they also have to call this game racist because of these characters. That is the whole point here....

I watched Petit's review earlier. She spent about ten seconds on misogyny and 8 minutes on praise, and the misogyny complaint doesn't even look unjustified.

Oh well. I'm ready to terrorize fake LA!

Good thing all those points were brought up in her review or you'd look really foolish right about now. Wait, she didn't mention any of that. And she gave it a 9 out of 10. Christ. People are acting like she gave it a 1 and said "GTA MUST BURN FOR IT'S SINS!"

Holy shit. Do we really need this ridiculous sexism discussion for EVERYTHING?

@hailinel said:

Is "Goodfellas" a bad movie because it's about despicable people, including a sociopath, an opportunistic snitch and a violent man with anger issues and a Napoleon complex, none of whom are portrayed as appealing in a different way than "they're gangsters, and I guess Henry Hill is less psychotic"?

@milkman: I wasn't trying to knock the Escapist review that hard, I actually think there are some good points being made in it. I just thought lines like the opener: In GTA V, you play as a terrible person. Are kind of funny. I mean the game is called Grand Theft Auto. I think it's important for anti-hero or bad guy protagonists to be well written, but seeing as I haven't played it yet I can't make a judgment call on the writing yet.

Giantbomb 5 outa 5. Now i know where jeff be getting his dough.

@ghostiet: Does Goodfellas suffer in your mind because of the way the characters are portrayed? I enjoy the movie, but that doesn't mean I can't criticize GTAV for having an unlikable cast if I feel the game suffers because of that.

Might check out Jeff's review just for the hell of it but I honestly don't care about those other sites and what they are scoring it. I already made my mind up when it was announced. I'm getting this game.

Review of Grand Theft Auto V

It’s quite good, with shooty bang bangs and drivey drive drives and it’s got men and women in it.

Source: http://www.heightofthegame.com/post/61036880434/review-of-grand-theft-auto-v

Best review I've read so far.

@milkman: I simply take great issue with using the word "misogynistic" because as I stated before thats a very powerful term. You don't just throw that around willy nilly. I doubt the Hausers are misogynists and likewise don't think their story has misogynistic qualities to it - unless there are plenty of scenes where men dominate over women, and intend cruelty and harm towards them for no reason other than their passionate hatred towards them. Excluding women from a story is not misogynistic and really it doesn't even always have to be sexist either. It would be nice if people paid to write for a living were a little more conscientious of what they put out there considering a lot of younger people tend to read their work.

Breaking news Tom Chick is liking GTA V http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2013/09/16/grand-theft-auto-v-review/

Is anyone else a little bit disappointed in Carolyn? If she was deeply and profoundly offended by the game's attitude towards women why is the game still getting a 9? She made a stand, and I applaud her for it, but she didn't go all the way. I still think that even amongst some of the most progressive and thick skinned reviewers there is a belief that certain franchises deserve a certain base score.

Disclaimer: I've pre-ordered GTA and I'm really excited to play it.

@humanity: I haven't read all the reviews but the "there isn't a female protagonist" doesn't seem like a talking point in a lot of the reviews. The complaints seem to be about the female characters that are actually in the game. Whether it's "misogynist" or "sexist" or whatever is really just semantics. I don't think anyone is trying to say that the people who make GTA are women haters or anything. Just that maybe the portrayal of women isn't very good. You might be right that misogynist is a strong word but I think the criticisms are still valid.

Oh the drama!

Dear god stop arguing semantics. Your definition is different than the definition I could pull from wikipedia, or from a different online dictionary / encyclopedia. We all know what misogny means, but instead of actually talking about the issue you are complaining about a mostly insignificant word choice. "It's getting to the point where I can barely go online to discuss video games, because everyone is too busy arguing about word choice."

This thread is embarrassing. Two reviewers briefly mentioned that there are some weird sexist things in the game, but the game is still totally great. You people are acting like the reviewer smacked you in the face and tied you up and read you a feminist newsletter against your will.

Just want to point out that this thread isn't specifically about one particular review, and she isn't the only one who has brought up the possibility of sexism and misogyny in GTA V in their review. That post you quote doesn't even seem to be about any particular review, but the general trend in game journalism.

Just want to point out that this thread isn't specifically about one particular review, and she isn't the only one who has brought up the possibility of sexism and misogyny in GTA V in their review. That post you quote doesn't even seem to be about any particular review, but the general trend in game journalism.

Dude you're not supposed to talk about things you think about stuff.

Sessler said that Trevor could be one of the best characters ever written, in any medium. Strong words, but I certainly look forward to finding out for myself.

But she is overwhelmingly the one being talked about/attacked the most. Including in this thread.

@ramone: Just to clarify, let me make sure I understand the point you're making; you are saying that she should have docked the game even further for the misogyny aspect, to make a point, but didn't because it's expected that a GTA game will have a certain high base score because it's GTA?

If so, I'm not sure I agree. As I mentioned before, it's absolutely her prerogative to feel offended or uncomfortable about the game's content in that sense, but docking it down to, let's say, a seven, would be incredibly misleading. A lot of people simply see a numbered score, and don't actually read the context of the review to go with it. When I see a game that has a 7/10 (Or, to simplify it, let's say a 3.5/5), I assume there is something mechanically wrong with the game, that it is broken in some way and the gameplay itself is hindered by the flaws. This is not the case-- I think her docking any more than one point from the game for this reason would have been disingenuous in a sense, but that gets in to a whole other conversation as to how games are scored and on what criteria they should be scored on, between objective mechanical factors and subjective opinions on content, and this is not the place for that.

If I misunderstood your meaning, though, I apologize for the long winded response, and I'd be interested to hear you elaborate.

@historyinrust: I appreciate the sentiment. It bugs me how knee-jerk the internet tends to be as a whole, and I fall in to the same habits more often than I'd like to admit, but I think in a situation like this where so much abuse is being heaped on the reviewer, it's important that people try to get their opinions out without turning it in to a tirade of FEMINAZI LOL TRANNY FREAK like so many people seem to be doing.

By the way, guys, not to get back on topic or anything, but based on these reviews I am super excited to play this fucking game. Even better, it's coming out three days before my birthday SO GUESS WHAT I'M GETTIN' FOR A BIRTHDAY PRESENT.

Er....word choice is VERY important when trying to get a point a cross. A single word can completely change the context,meaning and tone of a sentence. Id hardly say complaining about people frivolously flinging about the word "misogyny" is semantics.

@punkxblaze: My point was more that I don't believe a game which offends someone's sensibilities and beliefs like that can still get such a high score.