As millions of gamers worldwide have already discovered, Grand Theft Auto IV is an alright game. That being said, hit the jump to read my thoughts on the subject.

With a metacritic rating somewhere between 100 and 100, and sales of the game single handedly bolstering the world economy at a blistering 80 pre-orders a minute, it’s pretty safe to say the game is successful.

I even hear Jesus has put off the second coming, originally scheduled for summer 2008, for a few years, so he can get a 100% completion rating in the game. I also hear that Jack Thompson was overheard by a secretary offering “a mean motherfucking blowjob” to Rockstar execs in exchange for a free copy of the game. If this isn’t a late Christmas miracle, it’s an early one.

So while everyone in the world keeps going back and forth to the bedroom for a fresh pair of undershorts every time they even think of the game, I think it’s time we take a break from Liberty City and really contemplate what this means for the world.

Ok, who am I kidding? No one is going to take a break from that game. The only reason I’m writing this is because I can’t play it. I don’t even particularly like the series, but when you aspire to be a professional game reviewer and every reviewer in the world is having a collective orgasm over a game, you kinda sorta maybe need to play it. Just so you don’t have that feeling that everyone is laughing hysterically at a joke you walked in too late to hear. (That’s how I feel when anyone says “The Cake is a lie.” WTF? There’s cake in Portal? I thought it was about bending physics.)

So for the other three people on the internet not playing the game, let’s have a chat. This game is big. It’s huge. It’s breaking records and blowing minds at a rate unseen since… well, Call of Duty 4 I guess. Or Halo 3. But bigger. It’s so huge, some analysts are predicting it as the biggest competitor to this summer’s movie industry.

What does this say about the gaming industry? Games have become mainstream in a way we never could have anticipated in the last two years, due to the Wii, World of WarCraft, Halo 3, and Guitar Hero to name a few. And GTA IV is just the latest (and certainly not the last) game to grab the world by the balls and say, “Hey. How are ya?” And by this point, the world is starting to pay attention.

So, dear readers, (all two of you, I’m assuming one of you left to buy GTA IV by now), what do you think? Has this generation of games elevated the industry? Are we in a sort of “Gaming Renaissance?” Share your thoughts, if your brain hasn’t been completely melted by overexposure to pure awesomnium (I hear that’s what the GTA disks are made of).

Tags: Grand-Theft-Auto-IV, GTA-IV

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1 Comment » david (not david R) on May 20, 2008 7:51 am From Reader 1/2 .lol. I agree games are moving into the main stream. There one simple reason for this MONEY. Paper makes the world go round. Welcome to the 8th art!!! RSS feed for comments on this post. Comment Now Note: Commenting on Ripten does not currently require registration, however to be eligible for contests on the site, you must be a registered user. Name (required) Mail (will not be published) (required) Website Commenting Rules: No hate speech allowed. If you must argue, please debate intelligently. Comments containing selected keywords or outbound links will be put into moderation to help prevent spam. Ripten reserves the right to delete comments and ban anyone who doesn't follow the rules. Thanks. Notify me of followup comments Tired of the Goomba? Upload your own custom comment avatar.