At one point in the new (and highly acclaimed) Grand Theft Auto V game, players are required “to rotate the game controller’s sticks in order to tug out the victim’s teeth with pliers.” Such torture seems a bit extreme even by today’s video game standards. In The New Yorker, Simon Parkin asks: How evil should a video game allow you to be?

+ Some research has shown that playing violent video games desensitizes people as to what constitutes inappropriately aggressive behavior. I’m becoming more and more certain that my dentist plays a lot of violent video games…

+ “1:58 p.m.: This is my first bathroom break.” Buzzfeed’s Joseph Bernstein finished Grand Theft Auto V in one 38-hour sitting.

+ In Staten Island, three guys posed as police officers to cut in line and get their copy of the new game. On the plus side, they should be out of jail in time for Grand Theft Auto VI.