User:Robert Cohn/sandbox

Even though the game received great reviews for its storytelling and gameplay, it has been criticized for its perceived racial stereotyping. The game shows the avatar attacking different gangs based on their racial affiliations. Also the game strongly stereotypes each race when they are portrayed in the game. The Asians all have slanted eyes and talk in bad English, the Mexicans all have accents and drive low-rider, and the Black community all takes part in gangs and hates the police. Another argument is that by playing a gangbanger, you are furthering the racial stereotypes toward the Black community.

For all of the evidence for the affirmation of the games racist agenda, there is an argument claiming the opposite. The game is actually praised because it is the first game in the series to have a non-white protagonist and is set in a location in which community is favored over individualism. Many minority gamers have embraced the game because of the lack of minority protagonists in other blockbuster games. .

The racial stereotyping is seen as ironic by many gamers and actually can help players from different backgrounds to relate to the storyline. A white player can still connect to the Black storyline because the game speaks in a common way. As one Kotaku commentator said, “characters from vastly different backgrounds can speak to each other without moderating their slang or tone of speech, they understand each other completely, and make no comments whatsoever about each other's vocabulary, background or speech patterns. They just communicate as human beings.” This stereotyping is common to all games in the Grand Theft Auto series, but is extremely prevalent in San Andreas because of the games location in racially centered communities as opposed to a large metropolitan city. The Ohio State University’s Kiri Miller said, “[San Andreas] invites players around the world to join game designers in collaborative performances that comment on American pop culture and politics.” That commentary on American pop culture can be seen to unite the different races instead of dividing them because any game player can find a character they relate to and understand their point of view whereas in previous installments of the series, the same sense of relationship was not necessarily evident.