Rockstar Oyunlar’ upcoming Grand Theft Otomatik 6 has become the subject of an unprecedented marketing push that now includes coverage in fashion magazines and the full transcript of its gameplay demo. But it is also drawing attention to how adult content gets treated differently by major developers versus independent studios.
The game’s promotional campaign, which began with Netflix trailers and delays, moved through a long leak era into what one Polygon writer calls an “official blowout.” That has now entered a phase involving print media, including a cover story in Love magazine that mixed standard marketing claims—such as the assertion that every non-player character is distinct—with commentary on how the game evolves Grand Theft Otomatik’s satire of the American dream.
All 10,000 words of the unedited gameplay demo transcript with Rockstar’s Rob Nelson were published this week by IGN, following coverage from August. The writer notes that collective appetite for new information about the game “remains insatiable,” and there was enough detail in the transcript to sustain interest.
The discussion reached such a stage of intensity that IGN’s Rachel Weber had to publish a follow-up story denying she had seen protagonist Jason’s penis during a shower scene. Leaker Cyberleek then released footage confirming that, yes, in GTA 6, “Jason’s member is rendered.”
This follows last week’s confirmation that the game will feature sex scenes. That raised a more serious question about why the world’s biggest developer can explore sex in games while others face censorship.
Last summer, many indie games with adult themes—some pornographic, some serious, some both—were unilaterally delisted by Steam and itch.io under pressure from payment processors, who were themselves under pressure from conservative activist groups.
The TL;DR is that online stores like Steam and itch are not subject to age rating regulation the way games with physical releases (like GTA 6, even if it’s just a code in a box) are. This might sound like more freedom and less censorship, but in reality, it’s the opposite.
The platforms have no legal definitions or protections surrounding the games they sell, and often, no idea what the content of those games is actually like. That makes them much more vulnerable to external pressure of the sort we saw last year. An age-rated game is a game that has had its content verified according to what is legally permissible in that country. And if it’s legal, nobody can be stopped from selling it.
The writer concludes: “It’s weird to end a column about video game dicks with a call for more regulation, but this is the point. In the UK, where I live—and I think in the US, still, too—it is our legal right to look at a digital penis if we want to. Enshrining that right means platforms and indie developers submitting themselves to paperwork and red tape. But it’s worth it. Free the dong!”
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