hot-coffee posts

In 2005 a mod maker found a way to unlock a hidden sex mini-game that was put in by the developers of Rockstar North for their PC port of the open world action game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. The resulting firestorm of controversy cause some to file lawsuits against Rockstar's parent company Take Two Interactive.

The publisher eventually came to an settlement agreement in court where anyone who bought the original version of the game could get some cash for their trouble. Now Kotaku reports that those cash settlements, ranging from $5 to $35, are finally being mailed out to those folks who requested compensation for having that hidden "hot coffee" scene in the game.

It was an incident that changed how many felt about games and today the "Hot Coffee" mini-game that was discovered via a mod for the PC version of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas just cost its publisher Take Two Interactive more than $20 million. That's the amount the publisher said it was paying out today to settle a class action lawsuit that was filed against the company over the discovery of the mini-game.

The "Hot Coffee" mini-game, which was put in by the team at Rockstar North but hidden from regular playing of the game, was discovered via a third party mod when the PC version was released in 2005. The ESRB changed the rating from 'M" to "AO" a few weeks after word got out about the mini-game which caused Take Two to recall all the unsold copies of the game. It later re-released GTA: San Andreas without the mini-game and regained its "M" rating. The settlement today has still to be approved by the courts.

Even though Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto games mostly sell to console gamers nowadays, it was the PC version of GTA: San Andreas that got the game and its publisher into trouble a few years ago. The "Hot Coffee" mod unlocked a sexual mini-game hidden by the game's developers. The game was re-rated AO by the ESRB, pulled from store shelves and finally re-released without the mini-game as an "M" rated title. A class action lawsuit was filed and Rockstar and its parent company Take Two Interactive settled in court. The settlement let anyone who bought the game before the "Hot Coffee" mini-game was found to get paid between $5 and $35 or receive the revamped version of the title.

Well, it turns out only a few of the millions of people who bought the game decided to take up the settlement offer. According to the New York Times, only 2,676 claims have been filed and Take Two estimated it will only pay out $30,000 in the matter (of course the legal fees and funds it lost while it had to pull and then re-release the game are estimated to be in the millions). The settlement isn't quite final; it is set to be approved by a judge next week in court.