kottke.org posts about Grand Theft Auto
Sam Crane and Mark Oosterveen, actors out of work during the pandemic, were playing Grand Theft Auto when they found the Pinewood Bowl amphitheater and decided to try staging a production of Hamlet within the game with other players voicing all the parts. Grand Theft Hamlet is a documentary about the effort. It’s not streaming anywhere yet, but I hope it will be soon!
They audition all-comers: an uproarious business in which weird randoms show up with a tendency to destroy others by using a flame-thrower or rocket-launcher for no reason at all while the production is being explained to them.
They end up performing the play all over the city, “this is Shakespeare on a billion dollar budget,” not sticking to the amphitheater. The trailer looks great.
Watch video on YouTube.
Watch video on YouTube.
This video by Nukazooka of Grand Theft Auto being played by Lego characters is uncommonly well done. It looks more or less like the Lego Movie but made with a fraction of the budget.
Off-topic, but on their Twitter account I also discovered this cool 5-second video illustrating how air moves due to a passing semi truck. I can’t stop watching this!!
Conflict photographer Ashley Gilbertson recently embedded himself in the video game The Last of Us Remastered and sent back a selection of war photos.
Reminds me a bit of Jim Munroe’s My Trip to Liberty City, a film made from the perspective of a tourist visiting the city featured in Grand Theft Auto III:
(via @atotalmonet)
Update: New Gamer took photos of a road trip in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. (via @johnke)
He spends much of the time arresting criminals, taking people to the hospital in an ambulance, and putting out fires.
At this point my son was familiar with the game’s mechanics and hopped into the ambulance. As he put the crime fighting behind him, he wondered aloud if it was possible to take people to the hospital. I instruct him to press R3, and then he was off to save a few lives. He was having a blast racing from point to point, picking up people in need, and then speeding off to Las Venturas Hospital. During one of his life saving adventures, he passed a fire house with a big, red, shiny fire truck parked out front. He didn’t want to let his passengers down, so he took them to the hospital and then asked if I could guide him back to the fire truck.
A timelapse video of 15-days of game play in Grand Theft Auto IV. Sadly not set to the music of Philip Glass. (thx, rob)
Update: An early teaser video for GTA IV featured Philip Glass’ music as well as some timelapse footage. (thx, michael)
This year’s harvest of crop art from the Minnesota State Fair included Grand Theft Festal, a mashup of Grand Theft Auto and Festal-brand canned corn done in millet, alfalfa, canola, and white clover seeds. The artist recorded a timelapse video of its construction. (via mark simonson)
Grand Theft Mario = Super Mario Bros + Grand Theft Auto.
Steven Johnson’s open letter to Hillary Clinton regarding her call for a Congressional investigation about the effects of video games on children. “I know a congressional investigation into [the violence and hostility in high school] football won’t play so well with those crucial swing voters, but it makes about as much sense as an investigation into the pressing issue that is Xbox and PlayStation 2.”
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