GTAV's Characters Are Just Bad

[Bastard King]

Even though Mr.K repeatedly states that he would have given you information anyway? Even though the guy you're assassinating is very likely not a criminal? Even though Mr.K is in no way affiliated with any criminal organisation of any kind? Even though the two missions leading to the torture had you gunning down government agents who were just doing their job?

Yes. The torture worked a hundred percent in your favor and nobody in the game consequences for it, while at the same time it was still trying to pass itself off as anti-torture.

GTA, not just this game, but the entire series, is based around murder and fucking over the other guy to get ahead, why is it then that torture is just totally untouchable? It's not like rape or other sexual violence so it deserves to be in another conversation althogether, it's still just violent domination over another human being. As such, why is this depiction of torture just unacceptable? Is it because it made you uncomfortable? If so, congratulations, you have arrived at the point. But, I guess I'm just a fucking idiot.

That's a load of bullshit. That's like saying, "Whoa, so you think Glee is the worst thing Fox has ever associated themselves with? Is having gay people on TV just unnaceptable for you?"

The torture's not the problem at all. I've played plenty of games where torture is a main component. Red Dead Redemption for instance, has a scene where John Marston tortures Capitán De Santa for information, and it leads him into an ambush. Nothing like that happens in GTA. Mr. K doesn't come up in the rest of the game at all to either help or hurt anyone, and you got exactly the information you were looking for by torturing him.

It's bad writing, like the Republican Space Ranger cartoons, or pretty much anything Lazlow Jones was involved in writing.

 

[Acton Hank]

I love it how this article manages to state my big problem with so many games: The lack of motivation that I can relate to.

I really fear the day when a GTA protagonist watches my little pony and plays videogames between murder sprees.

Aha. Do you want to say something intelligent or can I put yourself on my mental ignore list?

I love it how this article manages to state my big problem with so many games: The lack of motivation that I can relate to.

Exactly why is having lots of money a hard motivation to relate to?

Because "he wants money" is not a good motivation to drive a story. Why does he want money? Is it just plain boring greed? If so, are there consequences? No? Then why the fuck should I care? There is no real hook to get me invested.

Explain to my why I should give a damn about a character who has no motivation besides the green?

As opposed to plain old boring "insert motivation here"

You could make anything sound bad when you word it like that.

 

[Annihilist]

Yahtzee, you are the most thoughtful person I've seen in gaming, and definitely on this website - why did you not do more Expo panels?

 

[Kingjackl]

I may be coming from a completely different position than Yahtzee in that I actually think the story and characters of GTAV are good, but I feel he may be missing the point of the characters.

Once again, he forgets that Michael did not directly choose to go back into his life of crime 'for the riches', he made some characteristically poor decisions that forced him to do it. His whole arc is coming to terms with the fact that he likes being a criminal, but is ashamed of this and also alienates his family as a result. I don't even get where he's coming from about Franklin; he just described Franklin's central conflict without explaining how it was bad or inconsistent. He wants to move on from the ghetto, but he's loyal to his old friends as well. That's just it.

As for Trevor, I don't see where the 'free-spirited rogue' description is coming from either; he's a monstrous psychopath, plain and simple. As a representation of the typical sandbox player, he's arguably a more accurate depiction than the whimsical caricatures that Saints Row features (though not saying that Saints Row is a bad series; it certainly isn't). Put simply, listen to anyone describing the activities they get up to when going off the rails in a sandbox game, chances are it will sound more like something Trevor would do. Taken out of context, there is nothing charismatic or likeable about stealing cars, running over pedestrians, shooting down innocents or blowing up cops. In real-life, these would be the actions of a deranged creep and that's who Trevor is.

Though I do like the 'father, the son and the holy ghost' bit. That's kind of clever.

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

Brace yourself for the incoming storm of fanboys howling in rage they you did not fall to your knees and worship their game.

I watched a lot of GTAV as my friend played it.
I kept saying "Wow what a bunch of aholes".

I have seen more of ZP fanboys here then GTA fans. I hear always from ZP fan when he review a popular game "brace yourself for butthurt fanboys coming in here and raging, hurr durr we are so smart". I'm getting sick of it.

Absolutely yes. There's never butt hurt here. If people flip out, it's cause they just made a throw away account and don't care if they get banned in 3 posts. The same thing happened on the on the Last of Us review, all legit criticism of it was drowned out by "lol, what did you expect? Butt hurt people are butt hurt. Its his opinion which means it can't be criticized". Yahtzee's criticism isn't even good anymore. Remember his "The Wii U will win the console generation cause it can be used without a tv" article?

 

[Bastard King]

I may be coming from a completely different position than Yahtzee in that I actually think the story and characters of GTAV are good, but I feel he may be missing the point of the characters.

Once again, he forgets that Michael did not directly choose to go back into his life of crime 'for the riches', he made some characteristically poor decisions that forced him to do it. His whole arc is coming to terms with the fact that he likes being a criminal, but is ashamed of this and also alienates his family as a result. I don't even get where he's coming from about Franklin; he just described Franklin's central conflict without explaining how it was bad or inconsistent. He wants to move on from the ghetto, but he's loyal to his old friends as well. That's just it.

As for Trevor, I don't see where the 'free-spirited rogue' description is coming from either; he's a monstrous psychopath, plain and simple. As a representation of the typical sandbox player, he's arguably a more accurate depiction than the whimsical caricatures that Saints Row features (though not saying that Saints Row is a bad series; it certainly isn't). Put simply, listen to anyone describing the activities they get up to when going off the rails in a sandbox game, chances are it will sound more like something Trevor would do. Taken out of context, there is nothing charismatic or likeable about stealing cars, running over pedestrians, shooting down innocents or blowing up cops. In real-life, these would be the actions of a deranged creep and that's who Trevor is.

Though I do like the 'father, the son and the holy ghost' bit. That's kind of clever.

This is probably the best analysis I've read of GTA V's cast. Particularly Trevor.

Really, the main problem with GTA V isn't the characters or the gameplay, both of those are fantastic. What brings GTA V out of "Top Five of All Time" territory is the story and the satire. It would've been vastly improved if they cut the torture bit, made Devin Weston and Martin Madrazo the same character, focused more on Stretch and Wei Chang, and merged ending options A and B into the same mission.

Everything written by Lazlow Jones should've been cut from the game entirely. The dude's a horrible comedy writer, and his shit being involved with a two hundred million dollar game screams "amateur hour." Not that Howser and Unsworth aren't complicit too, but seeing as how Rockstar games without Lazlow always have much better writing, I'll put most of the blame on him.

 

[IamLEAM1983]

I've got to admit that I'm warming up to Trevor after watching almost a complete longplay, but I can't deny the fact that he (and most of the cast) happens to be a terrible, terrible person. I've said it before in another thread, but one of the biggest problems I have with GTA is that its defense is satire.

I don't know if that's just me, but I don't see what's satirical in piling scathing parody after scathing parody. There isn't a woman in the game that isn't a raging stereotypical feminist that would make supporters of the actual cause cringe, and there isn't a man in the game that doesn't have some deep-seated issues that would also make most people cringe. As far as I know, satire is supposed to use humour as its main delivery device - not gritty exaggeration.

Considering, whenever I hear the defense that Los Santos is some sort of Faux Los Angeles populated by narcissists and sociopaths, I just have to reply with "How does that make the game funny in any way? How does that make me want to engage in that setting?"

The fact is that it doesn't. Fake Steelport feels a lot more like a playground to me, and SRIV's brand of sociopathy works for me because it's validated in the context of the already extra-silly Saints Row universe. Los Santos, in comparison, really reflects the fact that the Houser brothers aren't American or, well, even generally North American.

Starting with GTA 4, I got the feeling that the series' overall tone was one of going "Oh, you silly Americans, with your dreams and delusions of cultural relevance. You're really all wallowing in the same filth we all are."

Which is ironic, considering GTA doesn't so much poke at America as it does Western culture in general. By this logic, why hasn't Rockstar fictionalized London by now? What about Paris or Montreal, while we're at it? Why New York and Los Angeles, if neither of them really matter as far as thematic relevance is concerned?

 

[arcticphoenix95]

I love the double standard people have with this game.

You think the plot is terrible and the characters are unsympathetic? Everyone bends over backwards to defend your right to a differing opinion.

You think that the plot is interesting and that the characterization is good because criminals don't have to be sympathetic? Butthurt fanboy.

But that's just a problem I have with the Escapist in general. Nobody bats an eyelash when people state "Halo is shit" as fact (by the way, when you state that one game "is shit" but also hold some other game sacred, maybe you should reconsider your tone), but if someone says something like "David Cage is a terrible writer" then everyone suddenly develops an urge to argue.

Not to mention the asinine attempts by commenters to bait GTA fanboys into an argument. Funny thing is, out of the 260 comments on his last video, three or four of them disagreed with yahtzee's opinion on the game (in a civil manner no less).

 

[bug_of_war]

Brace yourself for the incoming storm of fanboys howling in rage they you did not fall to your knees and worship their game.

I watched a lot of GTAV as my friend played it.
I kept saying "Wow what a bunch of aholes".

Brace yourself for the coming, "Brace yourself-GTA Fanboys angry" posts.

I don't think anyone is gonna disagree there assholes, and I don't understand why this is suddenly new for a GTA game, none of the characters were ever good people.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

Jeez. This is a series about getting phone calls and running as many people over as possible in 30 seconds for cash. Why all the fuss? It was never about good characters, good stories. And the fact people are still buying it in the millions means it still isn't about that. The fast cars, the chicks, the baddassery, the drugs, everything that the adolescent kids wanted to do while living with their disapproving parents and which the game enabled for a short time between dull and dreary school days. That's what people want and that's what they got. I see no problem here.

 

[Kingjackl]

Really, the main problem with GTA V isn't the characters or the gameplay, both of those are fantastic. What brings GTA V out of "Top Five of All Time" territory is the story and the satire. It would've been vastly improved if they cut the torture bit, made Devin Weston and Martin Madrazo the same character, focused more on Stretch and Wei Chang, and merged ending options A and B into the same mission.

Everything written by Lazlow Jones should've been cut from the game entirely. The dude's a horrible comedy writer, and his shit being involved with a two hundred million dollar game screams "amateur hour." Not that Howser and Unsworth aren't complicit too, but seeing as how Rockstar games without Lazlow always have much better writing, I'll put most of the blame on him.

Oh, I agree. I like the torture sequence as an idea, but it sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of it. It's probably the closest the game gets to actually being satire, while the other stuff is just a whole bunch of broad exaggerations hiding behind the defence of being satire.

I'm not going into spoilers here, but I would have cut option B entirely. While option A is sort of justifiable, option B makes no sense at all. Actually, giving us the choice was probably not necessary at all, since C is just so much better than the other two.

 

[Ryleh]

Jeez. This is a series about getting phone calls and running as many people over as possible in 30 seconds for cash. Why all the fuss? It was never about good characters, good stories. And the fact people are still buying it in the millions means it still isn't about that. The fast cars, the chicks, the baddassery, the drugs, everything that the adolescent kids wanted to do while living with their disapproving parents and which the game enabled for a short time between dull and dreary school days. That's what people want and that's what they got. I see no problem here.

It's true, and as far as I'm concerned, if kids are wagging school to play a game where the moral of the story is pretty much "drugs, sex and money don't get you anywhere" then maybe we'll have more decent game developers rather than investment bankers coming up in the next few years.

Having said that, although the game is excellent without the story, it doesn't disregard the fact that a story was attempted. I'm pretty sure they didn't set out to make a brilliant game with a mediocre story, so what went wrong? That's what Yahtzee's trying to discuss here, and I think he's pretty much on the money.

 

[Ashcrexl]

Does anyone actually say that GTA isn't about the story? I've played every GTA game since Vice City mostly for their very entertaining stories. If it weren't for the story, I may have given up halfway through V's 40 hour campaign. The hilarious dialogue, ridiculous situations, burgeoning and disintegrating relationships, completely straight-faced evil, and Trevor's outbursts are much more engaging than the constant driving really fast and shooting guys that are pretty far away, which gets old much quicker.

Also, the world building is great.

 

[Jynthor]

Brace yourself for the incoming storm of fanboys howling in rage they you did not fall to your knees and worship their game.

I watched a lot of GTAV as my friend played it.
I kept saying "Wow what a bunch of aholes".

I see more people complaining about fanboys than actual fanboys.
And how dare you disagree with an article? This person knows a lot of words, obviously he is right!

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

What is with the Escapist and hating GTAV for not having moral/relatable characters?

Sometimes stories are about terrible evil people doing terrible evil things...not every story has a lovable character. Not every story needs one. Sometimes that makes stories far more interesting.

I enjoy the story and characters in GTAV. The fact that people can't accept a story about 3 horrible people committing crimes makes me very worried for the evolution of video games as a story telling medium.

Critiques like this stifle creativity.

The difference being that unnerving or just outright detestable characters in other stories (let's use Hannibal Lecter as an example), work because they have something that fascinates us about them beyond them just being a giant asshole. In Hannibal's case, the savagery of his crimes juxtaposed with his well-spoken manner and code of etiquette is at once creepy and engrossing; so we watch, despite him being utterly unsymapthetic, to see where this interesting contradiction will take us next.

The problem with GTA5's three protagonists is not that they're evil. It's that they're evil AND one-note, making them boring as well as unsympathetic. As Yahtzee points out, each of their personalities can be summed up in a sentence. Michael is a whiner who chases wealth although it's already established that wealth doesn't make him happy; Franklin is everyone's *****, despite his supposed reluctance, and Trevor is nothing more than a ball of disjointed meta-psychosis. That is all that we get at the start of the game, and at no point do they really go through much of an arc to change that status quo.

 

[The Random One]

I was playing GTAIV for the story. I must have been, because I played through to the end, and I'm sure as hell I wasn't playing that for the gameplay.

 

[TheUnbeholden]

These are GTA protagonists we're talking about here, right? Most of the time I agree with you, but in this case I cannot. Did anyone go into this game expecting these three to be holy beacons of morality? I sure didn't. But that doesn't mean that their "motivation" isn't there. All three characters have very defined arcs they go through.

Michael is a retired thief who was pulled back into the game by a younger man looking to make some money. When he gets back in, he remembers how much he missed doing jobs and making loads of cash. He is also haunted by what he did 9 years before the game, especially when he realizes Trevor lives close to Los Santos and eventually finds out what he and the FIB did. Michael is ready to move on with his live, but Trevor wants to keep the good old days going. He isn't ready to move into the present, only to embrace the past for the rest of his life. And Franklin wants to break into the business but needs Michael's help to find work. All of them have a reason to be there, and it's just as thrilling to watch as Niko Bellic's story.

Exactly they do have a motivation, sure there is a conflict as to how they manage to stay together, perhaps they do so out of sheer necessity. They need one another because making it alone is unlikely. I don't see that as a inconsistency of motivation.

While I understand Yathzee's inability to sympathise with the act of torture, but I think that was exactly the point. It has to be the player who does it. Can't think of anyone better suited than Trevor. It's good to take us out of the comfort zone.

 

[Flunk]

Honestly, I hate all of the player characters in GTA V. I still really enjoyed the game because the gameplay is fantastic and the production values are great. It's interesting to see what the Xbox 360 (or PS3) can do if they're pushed as far as they can go.

The player characters are boring, stereotypes. Not only that they do suffer from a distinct lack of consistency, especially Trevor. The only player character story-lines I enjoyed were the ones where they were getting screwed. Such as the missions where Micheal's horrible children would screw him over (generally because of his crappy parenting). I found that torture scene very difficult to play, I tried very hard to get around it some other way BUT THEY LITERALLY MADE IT IMPOSSIBLE. Because of that I really didn't feel like I had any responsibility for the torture and that did make me feel a bit better but they should have had another option.

GTA V is still one of my favorite games this year, but I doubt I'll be playing it for years. Replayability is a big issue these days, I think the only recent game I seem to gravitate back to is Sonic Generations and even that I'm fairly convinced is at least half nostalgia for previous Sonic games.

 

[taciturnCandid]

The real problem with GTA 5 was weak motivation. The whole motivation was to do this stuff for money, but they didn't really give a reason why they want the money. The property in the game could be bought, but all they brought were a few boring missions and just more money.

I guess you could invest in cars, but with the glitch that eats cars there wasn't a point. Not only that, but if you wrecked it or left it because of a mission you just wasted the money. Gameplay wise the difference between a lot of money and no money was the ability to have a fancy car for a few minutes before you wreck it. The clothes were pretty cheap and you could buy what you wanted with not much problem.

In fact, I had less fun once I had more money because I became afraid of dying because that means I would lose the only reward I got from story missions.

There are a few fixes for this. Give us a few properties that do more than generate money. Maybe something that opens up a new activity or makes a measurable change in the characters.

The only character that really sees any progress in their affluence is Franklin when you get to move to a bigger house. You can't really do much to make you feel like you are living the luxurious life. The game doesn't make you feel rich. If you were to remove the money counter and start up the game you would have no idea if you had it or not.

Other things would be to add the same system as multiplayer where you can insure your car. This means you can feel like your investments into your car matter and that your purchases matter. What does it matter if you spend 200k on a car if you just crash it and have to jack another. Or even worse in the millions and just lose it.

I'd like some permanency that comes with the money. I want the money to really matter and not just for temporary bonuses.

Until that changes I just don't feel that motivated by the story because I feel like the influence is something that really isn't the useful. As I progressed in Vice city or GTA IV I saw changes in the life of the character. You moved up and went somewhere. Here nothing really changes permanently.

 

[Caiphus]

I think this whole problem hinges around whether the reader wants it to be a problem.

Or, to put it a less awkward way:

If you like playing characters that have relatable motivations, then there is a good chance that you will have problems with some of the writing in GTA. The level of discomfort will be correlated to the amount of inflexibility you have on this issue. If you really don't like playing as a heartless bastard, then yeah, you will have problems.

And that's not necessarily a bad thing. I've seen people who didn't want to buy Payday 2 because they didn't want to play as a bank robber. Nothing really wrong with that. I'm not those people, but I understand where they're coming from. They don't find the idea of committing imaginary crimes fun. I'd be slightly curious as to whether they knew this ahead of time and, if so, why they bought GTA V. But then again they're supporting video game developers and trying something new, so who gives a damn?

If you don't mind playing as a criminal, and a lot of the people buying GTA won't - that's why they're buying it - (and this is where the 'what did you expect?' argument comes from) then the complaints may seem ludicrous. But they're not, really, they're just coming from people with different mindsets.

And that's where the gap comes from. Personal taste. I mean, I don't think GTA V's story is *objectively* worse than GTA IV, whatever that would mean. I actually had more fun in V. At least the characters' actions when the player controls them are better explained in V. It's been talked to death but Niko didn't make sense a lot of the time because he'd be whining about war crimes while driving full tilt down a sidewalk.

So yeah, this whole argument comes from two groups of people not being able to understand the complaints of the other. Which is how a lot of arguments get started, but there you go.