How About a Little Porn With That Larceny?     7/25/2005
By Stacey Phillips

Apparently a “game” that encourages decapitation and setting people on fire wasn’t entertaining enough.

News and Commentary

The latest version of the best-selling video game, “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas,” rolled out earlier this summer. Play Station 2’s review of the game raved about “slick visuals” and “cool graphic techniques.” Graphic is right--an Internet download for the game unlocks an entire panoply of pornography.

The extremely violent game has been under fire before. Attorney Jack Thompson filed a civil lawsuit in Alabama after an 18-year-old who was an avid Grand Theft Auto player gunned down two police officers and a dispatcher.

Thompson explained, “He bought [Grand Theft Auto] as a minor. He played it for hundreds of hours, [it] is primarily a cop-killing game. … He was given a murder simulator.”

But apparently a game that encourages the decapitating of police officers and setting people on fire wasn’t entertaining enough. Rockstar Games and its parent company, Take-Two Interactive Software Inc., admitted that they built sex scenes into the most recent version. Although they claim the pornographic clips were programmed to be “inaccessible to the player,” they can be viewed using a free, downloadable modologue, or “mod,” that allows the player to gain access to pre-existing content imbedded in the game.

Take-Two spokesman Jim Ankner minimized the issue when he spoke with the Associated Press: “[The] finalization of any game is a complicated task and it’s not uncommon for unused and unfinished content to remain on the disk,” he said.

In other words, the problem is not with his company paying their programmers to create porn for video games, it’s that they’re just bad editors.

The programmed material that “remained” on the disk includes scenarios in which the player can direct a porn scene and also play the starring role.

“This is one more example of a greed-driven industry that refuses to self-regulate,” said Jan LaRue, Concerned Women for America’s chief counsel. “Their meaningless ratings, which they know aren’t legally enforceable, are nothing more than an attractive nuisance. It’s why Congress and state legislatures need to make it illegal to knowingly distribute this kind of material to minors without parental consent.”

Politicians and media watch groups have reacted to the startling discovery. Under pressure, the game’s rating has been changed from “M” for mature to “adults only.” Several retailers, including Wal-Mart and Best Buy, said they will immediately pull the game from their shelves. Some have not decided yet on whether to carry even a cleaned-up version.

Regardless, the fact remains that millions of impressionable kids have already bought the game complete with this lovely bonus feature. In addition, popular teen Web sites are conveniently promoting the mods to activate the sexual material.

Not only are Rockstar Games’ actions despicable, they are also potentially dangerous. The American Academy of Pediatrics gives evidence that portrayals of sex on entertainment television may contribute to precocious adolescent sex. And according to the National Institute on Media and the Family, research shows that violent video games activate the anger center of the teenage brain while dampening the brain’s conscience.

Yet the video-game industry continues to churn out increasingly more violent and sexually explicit garbage.

Why would Rockstar Games go to all this trouble to put hidden porn on the Grand Theft Auto discs? Donny Wilson, a college newspaper writer, sums it up best:

“The obvious controversy over ‘Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas’ will be its biggest selling point. … It is these guilty pleasures that make GTA rule over all in its genre.”

Perhaps Donny would disagree if his character in the game caught sexually transmitted diseases or had to serve a life sentence for slitting a prostitute’s throat. But I suppose that would take the fun out of it. Besides, who expects life to actually imitate art? Certainly not the creators of Grand Theft Auto.

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