GTA 5: fan hit with brick, stabbed and robbed of new video game

A Grand Theft Auto fan was hit with a brick, stabbed and robbed of the new Xbox game moments after queuing to buy it.

The 23-year-old was attacked as he made his way home from a supermarket in the early hours of this morning.

He had been to the Asda superstore in Colindale, North West London, which had opened late for the worldwide release of the fifth version of the notoriously violent game at midnight.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "We were called at 1.20am to Princes Avenue, Colindale. A 23-year-old man was shopping, then on his way back home he was hit with a brick and stabbed.

"He was robbed of items he had bought from a nearby Asda supermarket, including a copy of Grand Theft Auto."

Police believe the attack was carried out by multiple suspects but said it remained unclear how many were responsible.

The victim was taken to a north London hospital, where he was in a stable condition this morning.

Detectives have asked witnesses to contact Crimestoppers with any information on the attack.

Twitter users meanwhile expressed their shock at the violent mugging, with one writing, "It's just a game".

The release of Grand Theft Auto V was expected to break sales records after hitting the shelves today.

Amazon, the online retailer, has already sold out of the game, which reportedly cost around £170 million to make and market.

Experts estimate it could generate £1 billion during its first year on sale when gamers are predicted to buy some 25 million copies.

Kevin McFeely, from the GAME store, said the company opened as many branches as it could last night.

GTA V has received rave reviews from critics across the board, who have labelled it "one of the very best video games ever made".

Video Games Do Not Make Vulnerable Teens More Violent

Do violent video games such as 'Mortal Kombat,' 'Halo' and 'Grand Theft Auto' trigger teenagers with symptoms of depression or attention deficit disorder to become aggressive bullies or delinquents? No, according to Christopher Ferguson of Stetson University and independent researcher Cheryl Olson from the US in a study published in Springer's Journal of Youth and Adolescence. On the contrary, the researchers found that the playing of such games actually had a very slight calming effect on youths with attention deficit symptoms and helped to reduce their aggressive and bullying behavior.

Ferguson and Olson studied 377 American children, on average 13 years of age, from various ethnic groups who had clinically elevated attention deficit or depressive symptoms. The children were part of an existing large federally funded project that examines the effect of video game violence on youths.

The study is important in light of ongoing public debate as to whether or not violent video games fuel behavioral aggression and societal violence among youths, especially among those with pre-existing mental health problems. Societal violence includes behavior such as bullying, physical fighting, criminal assaults and even homicide. And the news media often draws a link from the playing of violent video games to the perpetrators of school shootings in the United States.

Ferguson and Olson's findings do not support the popular belief that violent video games increase aggression in youth who have a predisposition to mental health problems. The researchers found no association between the playing of violent video games and subsequent increased delinquent criminality or bullying in children with either clinically elevated depressive or attention deficit symptoms. Their findings are in line with those of a recent Secret Service report in which the occurrence of more general forms of youth violence were linked with aggressiveness and stress rather than with video game violence.

Interestingly, the researchers of the current study found a few instances in which video game violence actually had a slight cathartic effect on children with elevated attention deficit symptoms and helped to reduce their aggressive tendencies and bullying behavior. Although Ferguson and Olson warned that their results could not be generalized to extreme cases such as mass homicides, they strongly advocate for a change in general perceptions about the influence of violent video games, even within the context of children with elevated mental health symptoms.

"We found no evidence that violent video games increase bullying or delinquent behavior among vulnerable youth with clinically elevated mental health symptoms," Ferguson stressed. Regarding concerns about some young mass homicide perpetrators having played violent video games, Ferguson stated, "Statistically speaking it would actually be more unusual if a youth delinquent or shooter did not play violent video games, given that the majority of youth and young men play such games at least occasionally."

Bathroom In Bar Utilizes A Hands Free Video Game!

Image of game just above a urinal, SO AWESOME!!!!

When it comes to bathrooms in Delaware bars, there aren't any in the First State that get more of a workout than those found in party town Dewey Beach during the summer.

Those long nights filled with beers and drinks regularly send the hard-drinking and sun-kissed to the bathroom in search of some relief – and one bar owner has decided to keep his male customers entertained even at the urinal.

The Starboard was the first bar in the U.S. to buy a pair of urinals outfitted with a new hands-free video game system that allows men to control a cartoon character on a television screen with their, um, urine stream.

That's right, the urinals have several sensors built into the basin, allowing men at the bar to control an on-screen video game and keep the good times rolling, even during a pee break.

In one game called "On The Piste," the customer's character is riding a snowmobile with penguins coming at him. Points are scored with each penguin that the snowmobiler runs into, controlled by where the man at the urinal directs his, well, you know. Scores and leaderboards are maintained, just like any other video game.

But as summertime Starboard regular Brent Rohm, 33, of Hockessin, points out, there could be a messy side effect to the urine-fueled video games.

"I really don't think they need any help getting any piss on the floor of The Starboard," jokes Rohm, who works for a local utility company and has used the urinals at the busy beach bar.

The specialized urinal games are the creation of U.K.-based Captive Media Ltd., which calls them the "world's first contact-free, networked, interactive washroom media system."

The company claims users playing the games are more focused on where they are urinating, so less of it actually ends up on bathroom floors. Starboard co-owner Steve "Monty" Montgomery now agrees after having them in his bar the past couple of months, even though he admits he initially had doubts of his own.

Montgomery discovered the urinals in March when he first walked into the annual Nightclub & Bar Convention and Trade Show in Las Vegas. He was immediately hooked and he paid $11,000 to get the urinals in his bar, which has had a high-tech summer, also embracing TabbedOut, an app that allows customers to pay their tabs using their smartphones.

So the question needs to be asked: Why would anyone pay that much money for something so silly and frivolous?

"Conversation pieces is what The Starboard is for me. Anything that will put a smile on somebody's face, I will spend money on," Montgomery says of the urinals, located in the bar's Shark Tank area, which is now open year-round. "The funny thing is watching the women try to sneak into the bathrooms to see them."

The urinal games are about to make a splash on national television. The games are slated to appear on an episode of the new bathroom-themed show King of Thrones, airing Oct. 1 on Destination America. (Yes, that is actually a program on TV.) It follows the work of bathroom maestros Jeff Hoxie and Dave Koop of Waconia, Minn.-based Hoxie Homes and Remodeling.

After the urinal was installed for the King of Thrones segment, Hoxie and Koop tested it with a friendly competition using water guns, says King of Thrones executive producer Matthew Ostrom.

"I'd say it's one of the more unique amenities featured this season," he adds.

Marketers have been targeting potential customers in bathrooms for years, whether it be with posted advertisements above urinals or even digital screens that run commercials. Now, some bar owners are looking to their bathrooms as another way to keep their customers coming back. (The Starboard's other bathrooms all have televisions, for both men and women.)

Having a little bit of quirky fun in a restroom in our region is nothing new.

At 1984, the pop culture-themed Wilmington "barcade" outfitted with video games, the men's room is plastered with a floor-to-ceiling collage of photos of The Golden Girlscast and the women's room is decorated with a similar collage featuring images of Michael J. Fox. Across town at Trolley Square's Añejo Mexican Grill and Tequila Bar, a giant poster from the Steve Martin comedy Three Amigos hangs in the men's room as a cheeky nod to the bar's Mexican theme. And at the old Blue Angel restaurant in Philadelphia, a French bistro, there were French lessons piped in through the stereo system in the restrooms.

So far at The Starboard, the games have been more of a conversation-starter than anything else. After all, almost everyone who encounters the intuitive video game urinals for the first time have never even heard of such a thing, never mind urinated into one.

"When I first saw it, I didn't know what it was, but once I started going to the bathroom, it automatically started and I figured it out. It's pretty hilarious," says Rohm, who has a friend who actually keeps track of his best scores. "When you have a high score, it gives you a link to post your score online and he actually did it. Some of the scores are pretty phenomenal. That's a pretty long stream."

For Rohm, it's a novelty that only works in Dewey Beach at hard-charging bars like The Starboard, which prides itself on an oversized party atmosphere.

"I don't think it's anything you'll see in [Hockessin's] Six Paupers anytime soon," Rohm says. "I don't necessarily think anyone would even admit to playing a pee game up here."