With all the hoopla about violence and adult content in video games, and with new Jack Thompsons popping up every week to decry the fall of society at the hands of the Rockstar Games of the world, one would think stores are handing out “murder trainers” willy nilly nowadays. Quite the contrary, actually. Last week I picked up my copy of Age of Conan, the new M-rated massively multiplayer game from FunCom, set in the Hyborian world of Conan the Barbarian. The game has gotten a lot of pre-release press for being a lot bloodier than its competing MMO’s, and in keeping with the Conan mythos and themes there’s quite a bit of aleing and wenching in the game.
I’m turning 30 next week, and I don’t think there’s any way I could even attempt to pass for younger than 25. But lo and behold, when I went to buy Age of Conan, the cashier at Best Buy carded me! This is the first time in quite a while that I’ve been carded for anything, and it was a rather gratifying experience. She seemed knowledgeable about the Conan game, and it was obvious that the employees had been instructed about how the game should be sold and who it shouldn’t be sold to. I count this as a big positive in the gaming market.
Contrast this to my picking up Grand Theft Auto IV at Circuit City on its release day and not being carded at all. Maybe the Circuit City folks just knew from sight that there was no way I was underage, but it was still a good feeling to know Best Buy is keeping an eye on who gets their hands on M-rated games. The stores and parents-not the lobbyists and conservative talking heads-should be the legislators for keeping kids from playing games they shouldn’t be playing.
A savvy forum member named Basa has unearthed an interesting nugget on Rockstar Games’ Social Club website, the community site that allows GTA4 players to track stats about the game. On the website, there’s a section called The Story Gang that is accessible only to visitors who have an account linked to their Playstation Network or XBox Live account and who have finished the story mode of Grand Theft Auto 4. Basa reports that in the Story Gang area, you’re able to click and drag items around on the screen. Beneath a book, Basa found a plane ticket for one Mr. Niko Bellic with a destination of San Andreas, the setting for the previous installment in the Grand Theft Auto series. Speculation is rampant about what this could mean, ranging from a red herring to Grand Theft Auto 5 being set in San Andreas to the exclusive XBox 360 downloadable content being San Andreas. Only time will tell.
It’s no surprise to anyone that Grand Theft Auto IV is a big hit, but it might come as an eye opener to learn that it now holds the all-time entertainment sales record, knocking the previous champion, Halo 3, down a notch. GTA4 moved 3.6 million copies in the first 24 hours of sales, and it made $310 million globally in its first day (Halo 3 previously made $300 million). As of this writing, the game now has sold around 6 million units and made over $500 million in the first week.
Like many, many other gaming console owners, I’ve been spending a lot of time in Liberty City over the past few days. It’s a pretty huge place with a ton of content, streets, buildings, and sights, and it’s easy to miss out on some of the spectacles of the town. That’s where Google Maps comes to the rescue. IGN has an awesome new application on their site that lets you browse through the Liberty City map Google-style, complete with points of interest, restaurants, shopping, nightlife, mission locations, secrets, and more.
Grand Theft Auto IV arrived in stores yesterday amid tons of hype, controversy, and urban legends (did you hear the one about the guy stabbed while waiting in line?). Apparently it also was swiped from a San Diego Gamestop by one particularly type-A personality crook. The cops caught up with the thief at a local restaurant and arrested him, and he proceeded to flip out in the backseat of their car. YouTube has the whole story, in all its Jack Thompson-stroking glory:
The special edition package of Grand Theft Auto IV (PS3, XBox 360) will include, among lots of other goodies, a CD soundtrack compilation of some of the many songs in the game. Amazon.com has released a track list for the CD, so you can get a glimpse at what you might be listening to while cruising through Liberty City in a few days:
Soviet Connection (Theme from GTA IV) by Michael Hunter
Dirty New Yorker by Mobb Deep (feat. Havoc & Prodigy)
No Sex for Ben by The Rapture
No Fraid A by Munga
Where’s My Money by Busta Rhymes
I Want You by C.J.
Rocky Mountain Way by Joe Walsh
Stand Up Jamrock by Bob Marley & The Wailers and Damian Marley
Don’t forget that tomorrow is the last day to enter the contest to win a copy of Grand Theft Auto IV! For the details on how to enter, check the original post:
After all the hype and hoopla, it’s almost here, and this is your chance to grab a free copy! I’ll be giving away one copy of Grand Theft Auto IV to the winner of this contest, and you’ll get your choice of the XBox 360 version or the Playstation 3 version. Here’s how to enter:
Post a comment on this message telling me one thing you can do to help promote Fandomania. The site’s still young, and more traffic means more contests and prizes, so give it some good thought, and give the site a hand! Alternately, you can post a comment telling me what sorts of posts you’d enjoy reading here. I’m all about writing about what you want to read, and sometimes it’s hard to pick topics! You’ll have until Friday, April 25, to post your comment here. Then I’ll do a random drawing from the commenters to pick a winner. The game officially releases on Tuesday, April 29, and the winner’s copy will ship out that day.
As if the excitement for Grand Theft Auto 4 couldn’t get higher, Kotaku has a new article detailing their hands-on experience with the game’s various multiplayer modes. The game types they sampled promise many hours of gaming after the single player game is long over:
Deathmatch This is a standard Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch gametype. Kotaku reports that the twist on GTA4’s version is that players are scored not by the number of kills they get but by the amount of money they collect during the round. They can grab money as it spawns on the map, or they can loot other players after they’ve taken them down. The multiplayer map spans the entirety of Liberty City, meaning that you can bring all manner of architectural and vehicular strategy into the mix.
Cops N Crooks Cops N Crooks is a variation on Deathmatch that has one team playing as the police in pursuit of the other team (the crooks). The crooks have a waypoint on their map that is an “escape point.” They win if they reach that point before they’re taken down by the cops. The cops, on the other hand, have as an objective to kill the crooks before they can get away with the loot. Kotaku describes two versions of this gametype. All For One has the cops trying to kill the crooks’ boss, who is one of the crook players. This presumably will allow for some interesting escort strategy where the crooks try to keep the boss alive while sacrificing themselves and respawning. One For All gives each crook one life with no respawns. Once the cops kill them all, the cops win.
GTA Race This is a checkpoint race through Liberty City that allows all the usual GTA mayhem along the way. Expect your road races to be derailed by your opponents wrecking your vehicle, gunning for you with rocket launchers, and generally causing all manner of trouble.
Hangman’s NOOSE
NOOSE is a cooperative mode that offers additional missions designed specifically for co-op. Kotaku has specifics about some NOOSE rounds they played, so check out their article to get even more hyped for this release.
Grand Theft Auto 4 is slated for release on April 29. Clear your calendars for the following month.
There’s been a deluge of promotional material about Grand Theft Auto 4, and it continues to pour out in these final few weeks before the game’s undoubtedly mega-huge release. The latest piece is a trailer sponsored by Gamestop. Check it out for even more appetite-whetting Liberty City mayhem:
couldn’t get higher, 
