The company and, more to the point, its insurance company are shelling out the money to settle a lawsuit from investors who claimed the company knew its programmers had hidden the sex scene in the game and decided to ship it anyway. Not a terrible idea; development is expensive, timetables are tight, and in any case the hidden scenes could only be unlocked with special software. But the company underestimated how strong America's Puritan impulses remain. Now it's spending 36 times what CBS was (unsuccessfully) fined for the crime of exposing America to Janet Jackson's nipple. It's just that inappropriate to take a break from your life of crime, for sex.

Polwat Chino, described by his parents as polite and diligent, was arrested late on Saturday after he was found trying to steer a cab backwards out of a Bangkok street with the severely wounded driver in the back seat, according to local newspaper reports.

He had paid to play the game at a local shop in Bangkok, and said he had needed more cash to continue playing it and that the taxi driver looked like an easy target.

Not only was the killer inspired by the game's violence; he committed murder in order to get more money to play the game. The incident makes GTA look like a mix of the worst elements of trashy media and crack cocaine. Rockstar, which makes the game, hasn't commented, but they'll have to do something serious. The day this happens in America is the day video game content regulation becomes a reality.

[Times UK]

Freefall (GTA IV) from VIP3Rz on Vimeo.

[Vimeo via Digital Urban]

"OK, let me be clear: I love GTA IV and I have no doubt that it is art, but an equal to "The Sopranos" or "The Godfather"? Narrative art of that caliber is distinguished by its ability to re-organize our preconceptions, to shift us into a world that's always been there but that we've been afraid to acknowledge, and I'm not convinced that GTA IV pulls off that miracle.

...For me, GTA IV is more an example of our evasions as a culture, more of a fairy tale, more of a story of consolation than a shattering cultural critique or even, dare I say it, great art. GTA IV is a game that allows you to forget how screwed-up and complicated things are in the real world; it could have done more, it could have put that screwed-up complicated world front and center."

Hollick said in the Times today that the Screen Actors Guild should negotiate standard contracts for videogames, royalties included. The guy who voiced GTA's Irish thug Patrick McReary agreed with him.

Their statements reek of a PR play by the guild, which is about to start contract negotiations with Hollywood studios. They also ignore the often grueling work of programmers and graphic artists involved with the game (cast listing), who would surely want their own residuals.

But the voice actors' well-mannered bitterness is understandable. I'd be upset, too, If I had missed out on a slice of what's sure to be a $1-billion-plus payday.

And no one wants to have to rent himself out to fans, like the guy who voices Roman is offering to do in this cheeky video (excerpted from this longer clip):

[Times, Jason Zumwalt]

The group's director of public policy, Dan Isett, had this exchange with a reporter:

Have you played the game?

"I've actually played 'Grand Theft Auto IV,' and it's right in keeping with previous versions. The series continues to lower the bar and this is the first game that has an alcohol content warning. You get points for driving drunk in this game."

You know that's not true, right? The game doesn't have points.

"If nothing else, it's a rewarded activity. Necessary for advancement."

I don't think so.

"But there's an alcohol content warning and a scene of drunk driving, correct?"

Yes. Did you play that part?

"No, no. I didn't get that far."

Well, get back to us when you've played it, Dan! It should't be hard; he says he has a Wii. Clean fun!

[via BoingBoing]

Chloe Parker went from tycoon tot to tycoon twat... She's got it all. Daddy, money, and one of those tiny little dogs that rich people keep in their vagina... Her penthouse in Algonquin's exclusive Little Barkings district is a palace in the sky complete with a motor drawbridge, torture dungeon, and servants with scurvy. This is real estate we can only watch on television and masturbate over. (After the jump, the clip, and two screenshots from Liberty City's self-mocking version of the web; and here's blow-by-blow coverage of Grand Theft Auto's new release from Kotaku.)

By the way, the whole promotional site for GTA4 is a fun little world parodying New York, much like the game, which Slate credits for its "narrative richness."

Instead of a backlash, the game got a gushing Times review that called the new GTA IV an "exhilarating, lusciously dystopian rendition of New York City... a simultaneously adoring and insightful take on modern America." It probably helps that "all of the content in Grand Theft Auto IV, including the sex scenes, were seen by an industry ratings body before the game went on sale," according to the Wall Street Journal.

I guess the paper didn't mind the line, "Fuck the shit out of it you nasty fucker," delivered during a car sex scene by one of the game's prostitutes. Not that most people who play the game will mind, either.

Here's a brief roundup of sex scenes from the game, culled from a longer video posted to Boinkology, which sourced it from IGN.

(And, no, this post has nothing to do with the ad campaign now running on Gawker, just for the record.)

[Boinkology]