I was just checking out one of those other gaming web sites which had some details re: GTA San Andreas. This wasn't the first I've heard of this, but for some reason it finally sunk in; in the new GTA you will be required to eat to stay alive. And if you don't eat often enough you'll get skinny, and if you eat too much you get fat.

I'm not a big fan of speculation. IMO the "game X is going to rock" and the "new Nintendo hardware is going to suck" sort of posts are kind of pointless. I should probably hold out on this post until the game is actually released, but here I am halfway through it.

I hate this idea.

Yes, I want (certain) games to be realistic, but not to the point where it intrudes on the gameplay. ESPN 2K5 is pretty realistic, right? How would you like it if the game was constantly interrupted by commercial breaks, like in real life? Or if your wide receiver screamed at you after the game for not getting him the ball enough? Or if you had to sit through a ten minute "show" at halftime?

In GTA VC you could eat, and it would improve your health a little. Who wasted time with that? And now this is going to be a major, required element of the game?

This is the same problem I had with Shenmue. Remember how you would be looking for someone and the person you're asking would say "He's not going to be around until tonight", and you would actually have to wait? I thought that was so cool the first time it happened. But it was just constantly happening. Buy some ramen, play some arcade games, talk to Mom...who needs that in a game? I never got that far into it, but from what I understand you eventually had to get a job to make money, and actually do the job in the game!

Is eating fun? I don't mean going to a restaurant with your girlfriend and your pals and ordering nachos and drinking four beers. I mean the actual act of eating. And I mean eating in the realistic physical sense, not like in Pac Man, wise guy.