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A TV drama series based on Grand Theft Auto is in the works at the BBC, the corporation has announced.
What will it be? Will it be based on the game proper, on its creation, its history or its makers? All of that remains unknown. All that we do know is that the series was announced as part of the Make It Digital initiative that aims to give a coding device” to every Year 7 (11 year old) child in the UK.
The drive will include a season of programmes and online activity involving the BBC’s biggest and best-loved brands” including Doctor Who, EastEnders and a new BBC Two drama based on Grand Theft Auto”.
Make It Digital partners include Google, Tech City UK, Samsung and BT.
This is exactly what the BBC is all about – bringing the industry together on an unprecedented scale and making a difference to millions,” BBC Director-General Tony Hall said.
Just as we did with the BBC Micro in the 1980s, we want to inspire the digital visionaries of the future. Only the BBC can bring partners together to attempt something this ambitious, this important to Britain’s future on the world stage.
BBC Make it Digital could help digital creativity become as familiar and fundamental as writing, and I’m truly excited by what Britain, and future great Britons, can achieve.”
UPDATE:Develop has got hold of some more concrete info about the GTA show.
The drama will run for 90 minutes and tell the story of the series’ creation.
GTA offered gamers the chance to step into a fantasy world where they could behave like criminals, gun down rival gangsters and cops, hijack cars and venture deeper into an imaginary American gangland underworld. But the violent gameplay coupled with its outstanding success led to fierce opposition: from parents worried about children immersing themselves in such a violent world; from politicians, alarmed at the values it encourages; and above all from moral-campaigners, who have fought passionately to stop it.
Grand Theft Auto tells the story of how the game was conceived and created and the subsequent fallout as various groups objected to its violent gameplay.”
