To follow Stockholm Pride’s mission to spread love and equality – we created a digital pride parade inside one of the most violent games in the world – Grand Theft Auto 5 (GTA 5). The Los Santos Pride parade – named after the fictional city within the game – was free to download, so every player could have their own digital pride parade inside the game. The modification (a plugin that modifies the game) was created together with real Grand Theft Auto 5 fans across the world and was launched with a trailer on Youtube and Facebook. To honour the victims of the mass shooting at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, the whole parade was made indestructible. Why? Because love will always triumph over hate.
Creative Execution
A mod, short for modification, is when you add or alter the code of a computer game. GTA 5 has a devoted fan following with lots of mod-creators. Most of the already-existing mods add new cars or clothes to the game. In order to create Los Santos Pride, we searched in fan forums for people to join us in the creation of the pride parade mod. In collaboration with some of the most talented GTA 5 amateur code scripters and texture designers we started creating Los Santos Pride. We created new cars, custom made clothes, rainbow flags, face paint and signs saying “Love comes in all colors”. We also included GTA 5’s main characters Trevor, Michael and Franklin in the parade. However, towards the end of the scripting process, the horrific shooting at the iconic gay nightclub, Pulse, in Orlando, that left 49 people dead and over 53 others injured. Therefore we decided to make the parade indestructible (in a game where literally everything is destroyable) – not to moralize over gaming violence but to rather show that love always triumph hate.
The mod was released via a website and a video trailer on Youtube and Faceook, featuring legendary BBC1 voice Pete Tong – announcing this unique day in the history of Los Santos. The trailer also features music from famous Swedish electronic producer Alesso.
On the official website lossantospride.com people could download the PC modification for free. The website also contained fan art in the form of desktop backgrounds.
This previously unseen take on gaming modifications led to a high attention from media and journalists. From gaming and internet culture outlets such as Kotaku and Vice, to mainstream news such as BBC and Metro – sparking a conversation about LGBT+ rights and representation in the gaming world.