Sorry for the non-baseball post but I wanted to post this. I’m a huge fan of the franchise. I beat San Andreas twice (hey girls!) and loved Vice City. I’m sure almost every American has at least watched a piece on or read a story about Grand Theft Auto IV the past week. I was one of those Yahoos that went to the store at midnight on Monday to get the game and took the next day off from work in order to play all night. I’m not kidding, I spent midnight on my 30th birthday waiting on line to pick up my video game.

I’m sure you’ve seen at least one story on the cable news channels regarding GTA (I’m certain they write these to scare old people). Case in point: I was in my company’s break room yesterday and CNN was doing a story about the evils of Grand Theft Auto IV. First off, I swear they are basically re-running the same video game story over and over again and just interchanging the names Duke Nuke’em and GTA IV. Secondly, could any of these stories include someone with knowledge on the subject of the game on which they’re reporting if not just the game in question? The reporter obviously hasn’t played a video game since Pac-man if ever. The main anchor had the following exchange with another in studio anchor whom I assume was supposed to have done at least some research or maybe play the game (I do give CNN credit for putting two hot chicks on the screen to discuss hookers and lap dances, but they could have at least made out for a while! Zing!):

“Expert” on the subject Reporter: You’re character can get a lap dance, mug people, and drive drunk.

Appalled main Anchor: “If this video game is so lewd and distasteful, why is it such a big popular item?”

“Expert” on the subject anchor: “Well the big attraction is that you can play on-line with up to 16 players!”

As if that is some kind of groundbreaking feature. Wow, did she miss the point. I don’t watch CNN often, but I can assume if this female anchor, let’s call her Susie, was trusted with covering other popular tech products, I’m sure it would go like this:

Q: So what makes ______________ such a popular item, Susie?

The I-pod? - “It has ear phones!”
The I-phone? “It has an alpha numeric key pad!”
The Hi-Def TV? “It’s in color!”
The DVD Player? “It comes with a remote!”

Also, anyone that plays the game to get lap dances, kill hookers or drive drunk (A feature im certain they added for shock value; it isn’t fun or challenging) is either 14 or lacks the skills of a hard core gamer and thinks Pete Alfano articles are clever and funny.

Anyway, all the old ladies in the break room were watching with their mouths open and shaking their heads in shock and disgust as they ate their Weight Watchers microwave lunches.

You kids today with your loud music and your Dan Fogelberg, hula hoops, Zima and your Pac man video games…