Scottish icons: Grand Theft Auto

Scots stand accused of having given many awful things to the world: television, the telephone, the steam engine. But this week’s Icon is alleged to have created something that turns your sons into killers and your daughters into “whores”.

I should say that the Icon under advisement is a computer game, whose creators were undeniably Scottish, despite the landscape they devised being indubitably American.

We speak of Grand Theft Auto (GTA), created by Scots David Jones and Mike Dailly, with later involvement from Dan and Sam Houser (English), Leslie Benzies (Scottish) and Aaron Garbut (Dundonian).

Company-wise, the game comes under the aegis of Rockstar North, based in the old Scotsman building at Holyrood, wherein your scribe here used to ply his trade or calling.

We should note at the outset that, in recent weeks, Rockstar has found itself at the centre of allegations of unfair dismissal and the blacklisting of trade unionists. The company says the dismissed workers breached confidentiality agreements which, between you and me, are an essential feature of today’s free society.

That was a joke by the way (got to point them out nowadays). Pains me to say that several people at Rockstar have punched and kicked me in the face in the past. Some of the best martial artists I ever worked with. Good luck to them if they’re involved.

The new Grand Theft Auto is out next month (Image: Rockstar North)

That said, I have not assembled you here today to discuss an industrial dispute and ongoing tribunal. We are here to talk about the critically acclaimed and widely criticised game that has shifted 470 million units, making it one of the highest-grossing – or to its critics just one of the grossest – media franchises of all........

© Herald Scotland