(Image credit: Rockstar Games / Comedy Central)

Rockstar has found a brilliantly left-field way to show off Grand Theft Auto VI : by smuggling new footage into South Park. It’s one of the smartest bits of brand placement I’ve seen in a long time but its also just the right kind of unexpected disruption I'd expect from Rockstar.

Game marketing usually runs on slick trailers and carefully managed hype. A dog poo weapon demo inside a crudely animated cartoon is the opposite of that, but it works. The latest episode of South Park (or is it South America now?), ‘Guinea Pig on a Stick’, aired on 28 October and included around 20 seconds of previously unseen gameplay from the forthcoming open-world game, GTA 6.

The clip follows protagonists Jason and Lucia along a busy Vice City beach before switching to Jason, who spots a dog doing its business on the sand. The owner dutifully bags the mess, but Jason has other ideas.…