GTA IV Edited for Weapon Insertion in "Private Area"?

The latest rumour to raise its head into the miasma of Grand Theft Auto IV chatter floating on the Interweb suggests that the cut content from the Australian version of the game includes a weapon being inserted into a character's "private area".

A forum poster reports that they called Take-Two (saying only that they called "a friggin expensive 1902 number" - an Australian pay-to-call suffix) and were told the following:



This is then made more specific by another poster who claims to that one cutscene, "involves some low key methods of torture and ends with a character having a baseball bat jammed up his ass".

This echoes a posting to Wired earlier this month (April 4th) that states, "I've read a rumour that the scene cut is of someone getting...buggered...by a baseball bat (!)"

Surely the Take-Two rep on the end of the 1902 number was having a larf? Apparently not. When asked, the rep said:



Of course, this one needs filing firmly under 'rumour' for now, with only a forum poster's word to go on. SPOnG has contacted Rockstar for comment and will let you know what comes back.

Rockstar produced an edited version of GTA IV for Australia in order to comply with its ratings system, which has no 18+ category for games. You can see the company's official statement on the subject here.

Hilariously though, this rumour could add to the value of the third (well, officially second, if you take the fact that a Grand Prize isn't, for some reason, First Prize) prize in the Xbox Live/GTA IV competition that closed two days ago. That prize? "Two Thousand Second Prizes: A Rockstar baseball bat".

If you want to read more about GTA IV, check out SPOnG's recent hands on and Girl Gamer column.

^{Sources: Whirlpool.net
Wired}