Burger Motorsports plans to ‘pause’ operations for Grand Theft Auto VI release day

A speciality car-parts manufacturer in Southern California announced a company-wide “pause” in operations ahead of the highly anticipated release of the video game Grand Theft Auto IV — as many fans are expected to call out sick that day in order to play.

Simi Valley-based Burger Motorsports announced that there would be a “temporary company-wide operational pause” on Thursday, November 19 — the same day Take-Two’s interactive game is released, a post on the company’s Instagram read.

“After reviewing multiple employee scheduling conflicts, management has determined that normal business operations may be impacted due to the release of Grand Theft Auto VI,” read the memo, addressed to staff, customers, dealers and partners.

“Several team members have already notified management that they will be unavailable, unreachable, and/or ‘in Vice City’ for the duration of the day,” it added, in reference to the fictional city where the popular game is based.

The memo goes on to state that several “departments may experience delays” including “engineering, “social media,” and “general productivity.” 

It also said operations would resume “once employees have completed their initial exploration, finished at least one mission, and returned to reality.”

Burger Motorsports acknowledged to The California Post that the memo was a joke.

“We posted the ‘pause operations for GTA VI’ announcement as a playful, tongue-in-cheek nod to the excitement around the release,” the company said.

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“Burger Motorsports is operating normally, and customers can rely on our usual order processing and support. It was simply meant to give the community a laugh.”

Grand Theft Auto VI is due for release in November following several earlier delays, as fans have been waiting for more than a decade for the game.

The previous entry in the series, “Grand Theft Auto V,” came out in 2013 and has sold over 200 million copies, making it one of the best-selling video games ever.