Regarding San Andreas. As someone who has finished the game, I can understand when people say that the game “doesn’t really teach about the consequences of taking certain actions. Actions like stealing cars, killing people, eating nothing but fast food”.

Ok, maybe it doesn’t to the degree that we would expect. But it does it to some extent. In the first 5% of the game, you won’t have too much problems with the police because it is supposed to be the easiest part of the game. But once you advance in the game, believe me that you don’t want to mess with the police, and your actions will make you to be frequently pursued by them, so there are consequences. It is also very difficult to escape from the police, as they block streets, form barricades, etc.
Eating nothing but fast food makes you fat as well, and it changes the physical appearance of CJ. Nevertheless you have the option to eat salad meals and regain your health without getting fat.

I do not want to spoil it for you, but as you progress in the game you will face some events that make the “gang fantasy” less fantasy and a little bit more depressing (but just a little bit).

As Pedro Tejeda said before, some of the elements you mentioned have been included in GTA IV. You may find this article interesting:

http://www.slate.com/id/2191012/

It is written by a sociologist who befriended a gang for 7 years.

pedro: i’ve done some spoiler reading. that ‘exaggeration of the boyz in the hood’ theme is exactly what i don’t like about the game - it feels like it’s selling a black gangsta fantasy to white people. i’m curious - what’d they do from this post in GTA 4?

DSimon: thanks for the GTA tips. i’ll check out Way of the Samurai. i remember hearing ages ago that Hideo Kojima wanted the save data to be erased when a player died in MGS3 - i would have LOVED that.

The way you describe it really reminds me of a tragically underrated game called Way of the Samurai. Its story was also branched into distinct segments selected based on the player’s choices, and there were only a few hours from the beginning of the game to the end. That gave it the freedom to explore a wide range of possible story paths, without trying to make everything emergent. It also made it a lot of fun to play the game through several times, seeing how a different choice at one point might affect the future.

Another interesting design element in that game: if you died, it reset your save file. The only real way to proceed was to avoid fights unless you were sure you could win them, because death was serious business. This is one of the most extreme measures I’ve seen a game take to add consequence and weight to violence, and it worked quite well.

Oh, by the way: in San Andreas, don’t bother trying to take over the entire town for CJ’s gang in the beginning. The territories will all be reset once you unlock the other towns, so it’s a total waste of time to focus on that at all at the start.

The game is also an exaggeration of the theme (boyz in the hood) instead of something that is supposed to be realistic. The previous game, Vice City is very similar in tone.

Also, alot of the ideas you suggested are executed in Grand Theft Auto 4.

(Also those silver guys from Final Fantasy. The one with short hair is gorgeous!)

That would be awesome. I’m not sure putting the reality of the -isms in games where the exploration of oppression is not a part of the game would be a great idea though. I mean imagine if you’re just playing a straight RPG and you end up dealing with the same shit you deal with in real life…in a video game. It might come off as less social commentary and more reinforcing of marginalization.

That’s when I thought about all the main videogame characters that were black. Needless to say, I could hardly think of any. Now with all of the race and videogame talk floating around in the air, my decisions seem slightly more important.

JC Denton has the personality of cardboard. That’s what’s wrong with JC Denton. Sure, it’s great that Deus Ex is so open-ended, but for the love of God, they could written (and voiced) a character with that same potential and more, well, CHARACTER.