Obligatory daily GTA4 post

Full disclosure: I was one of the elite group of nerds who waited in line at midnight to purchase this game, so I have a serious axe to grind with anybody who badmouths it. Oh yeah, it also didn’t work on my old-ass POS 360 due to technical issues so I went out and bought a new one the next day.

Side-note: if you want to purchase my old-ass XBOX that doesn’t work very well, please let me know because I will cut you a sweet deal on it. I’m a generous guy, I know.

Anyway, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, one of the most well-organized, influential, well-intentioned, and obnoxious special interest groups in all the land is already setting the gears in motion to publicly shame and harass GTA4’s producer Rockstar Games.

For anyone unfortunate enough to not have played this game yet, it is worth pointing out that the amount of detail the programmers put into the game is absurd. Besides doing missions and randomly killing people or crashing cars in hilarious ways, you are expected to build up relationships with other characters in the game by doing things like calling them up on your cell-phone and inviting them to join you for fun activities like shooting pool, going bowling, or hitting up the local dive bar for a few fine Chardonnays. Building relationships helps your character by giving you back-up when you get involved in dicey situations or reviving your health after a roll in the hay with a new lady-friend.

MADD, of course, is pissed at the fact that the game allows you to go to the bar and then stumble out and drive your friends back to their homes. Their public statement is right here. This knee-jerk reaction condemning the game’s developers for including this new feature misses the mark for the same reason that most of the Grand Theft Auto critics do: it demonstrates that they are out of touch and haven’t played it.

Driving drunk in this game is hard as fuck, and it often gets you into serious trouble. If a police officer sees you driving in this state, even if you do nothing else wrong, you get a wanted level and risk getting arrested. Just today, I went out with my cousin and got e-shitfaced and attempted to drive him home. I had planned to undertake a lengthy mission right after I dropped him off, but I got screwed when I crashed my car, it caught fire and exploded and killed my beloved cousin Roman. I managed to escape getting fucked by the long dick of the law myself, but it still put a crimp in my action to have to go out of my way soon afterwards to pick his reincarnated soul up at the hospital and drive him back home. I was sober this time.

It’s a funny diversion, but most kids probably understand after playing the game that driving drunk gets you into all kind of bad situations that are otherwise avoidable. MADD should relax, recognize that kids realize drunk driving is a choice, and focus on raising their children to tell the difference between right and wrong. I bet you anything a lawsuit is going to follow in the wake of this, and I hope to god it goes down in flames at the hands of a judge wielding his equitable powers like a black-robed, freedom-loving champion. Fucking nanny-staters.