14 DAY TRIAL // There's not a single person in this world who's watched at least an episode from The Simpsons TV Show and doesn't love those guys. They stand for the American clich?, what's worst and funniest in all of us. Obviously, the game's producers, EA couldn't avoid parodying gaming phenomena and they got into trouble because of that.
The Simpsons lead designer Greg Rizzer claims that he thought that parodies are some sort of wackier tribute to a certain product, considering that a GTA parody will never hurt its sales. He also mentions that because of some game producers' reactions, EA had to "pull stuff from the game". One of the most recent cases of offense being taken because of a The Simpsons parody happened at the Leipzing Games Convention, where "someone" felt offended by a poster that said "Grand Theft Scratchy".
That was the name of one of the game's levels, but the offended person asked that the poster would be taken down. Of course it was probably some Rockstar employee, reading too much into the whole parody concept. Greg Rizzer also stated that a Guitar Hero parody is included in the game and it's called "Sitar Hero". It will feature Apu playing his 60-button controller thingy and singing tunes like "Pour Some Curry On Me". There's also a poster of this scene and the Harmonix guys took no offense at all, asking EA to send them 20 copies of that wallpaper.
It all varies depending on how open minded some PRs (or lawyers) of major gaming companies are... Daxter also parodied Matrix or Lord of the Rings and no one took offense then. Are the great names of the industry afraid of the competition? Super sales are expected for EA's title so it was only a matter of time till the rival companies got envious...