4. Controversy
I've written a few articles on the controversy caused by GTA over the years; for some reason it's a subject I find highly fascinating. After all, GTA really is gaming royalty and I'd in fact directly attribute that to the s**tstorm of criticism the title has received over its life span for its graphic and uninhibited presentation of violence, gang culture, drugs, foul language and just about every other undesirable human endeavour you'd care to shake a snub-nosed Uzi at. Whenever a new GTA title comes out, hoardes of concerned critics follow in its wake, some even in positions of political power. That's fact. As a direct result, GTA receives mainstream media coverage the likes of which few other video games can ever hope to enjoy. And as you may or may not be aware, there's no such thing as bad publicity. Or to look at it another way, the game everyone seeks to discourage us from playing actually sells through the roof instead. R* are all too aware of this, which is why each game to date has contained some new feature, some new mechanic that's been designed to directly cause controversy (drunk driving in GTA IV for example, which came under fire from Mother's Against Drunk Driving). You'd be a fool to think that they wouldn't look to repeat this rather clever model in GTA V. Guaranteed, one of GTA V's brand new features will spark a whole new area of controversy and as a result it'll once again be in the papers and the 9 o'clock news making history once more for its insistence on stirring the pot.