Grand Theft Auto (video game)
Grand Theft Auto is an action-adventure video game developed by DMA Design and published by BMG Interactive. It was first released in Europe and North America in October 1997 for MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows. It was later re-released on 12 December 1997 in Europe and 30 June 1998 in North America for the PlayStation. It is the first instalment of the "Grand Theft Auto" series, to be followed by 1999's "Grand Theft Auto 2". The series, which has led to five main entries and several special edition games over 16 years, has sold more than 150 million units as of September 2013. The story follows a group of criminals in three fictionalised versions of US cities as they perform bank robberies, assassinations, and other illegal activities for their respective crime syndicates.
Take-Two Interactive
In March 1998, Take-Two acquired BMG Interactive, the dormant video game publishing division of BMG Entertainment, for 1.85 million shares (16% of Take-Two's common stock), worth about . In the previous year, the United Kingdom-based DMA Design and BMG Entertainment had just released "Grand Theft Auto", and while it financially performed well but was not a critical success in Europe, it had sparked controversy over the use of violence in video games, with United States Senator Joe Lieberman speaking out strongly against it. Seeing the opportunity to capture attention on the game, Brant had initiated the acquisition of BMG as to acquire the "Grand Theft Auto" property, and at the same time, contacted BMG's Sam and Dan Houser (both instrumental to getting "Grand Theft Auto" to market), Terry Donovan, and Jamie King to found a new label within Take-Two, called Rockstar Games for which to develop more titles like it. Electronic Arts' (EA) 2008 CEO, John Riccitiello, stated that, with the establishing of Rockstar, Take-Two effectively invented the "label" corporate structure, which EA would follow into in 2008. With the rights to "Grand Theft Auto", Take-Two expanded its publication into North America, and the game became Take-Two's first finanicial success with over 1.5 million copies sold.