In fiction.

So is shooting someone, setting fire to houses, etc etc.

Games aren't reality, setting fire to a house in skyrim doesn't mean you've commit or are planning an arson and should be sent to prison.

I agree that somehow "rape in a game" feels different from "shooting someone in a game". Does it feel different because of the puritanical christian culture we've been brought up in, where cops murdering people with guns is normal and celebrated, but priests raping young boys is still mostly hidden? Is it because there's some fundamental difference between the two crimes? Is getting perverse sexual pleasure criminal, but having fun shooting people in grand theft auto is okay?

My opinion is that even though it feels different, it's fine. Consensual rape-play in the bedroom isn't my cup of tea, I won't do it, it gives me the ick, but people can do what they want. If those same people want to play rape games, well, it gives me the ick, but that's up to them, they and the game developers consent to this media existing, and it's fiction, just like rape-play in the bedroom is. The safe word is alt+f4

(throwaway account because obviously)

We also have murder and the most horrific things, including going around and shooting unarmed civilians in GTA in Video Games.

There's a difference between speech about a thing, and the actual thing. The former should be legal, the latter sometimes isn't.

I can make jobs about chopping people up all day. That doesn't mean I should get life in prison for murder.

My god, those poor pixels are being sexually abused!