After years of craving from followers, intense hypothesis, rumors, unthinkably large knowledge breaches, and even an FBI Investigation, co-founder and President of Rockstar Video games Sam Houser posted on the studio weblog and Twitter account on November eighth that the “first trailer for the subsequent Grand Theft Auto” shall be launched in early December.
We’re very excited to let you understand that in early December, we’ll launch the primary trailer for the subsequent Grand Theft Auto. We stay up for many extra years of sharing these experiences with all of you.
Thanks,
Sam Houser— Rockstar Video games (@RockstarGames) November 8, 2023
In just some hours, the tweet had almost 100 million views, virtually 5 hundred thousand retweets, and over a million likes. All for an announcement of an announcement.
However how did hype for the subsequent entry within the vaunted collection attain such a fever pitch? Let’s check out every thing we find out about Grand Theft Auto 6.
The Earliest Experiences
Whereas we didn’t get any concrete particulars about GTA 6 till a report from Kotaku in 2020, there have been murmurings about GTA 6 for over a decade – earlier than GTA 5 was even launched. Between hypothetical feedback from the newly-departed former president of Rockstar North, Leslie Benzies, in interviews with Digital Developments in 2012, and a TechRadar report in 2016 claiming that GTA 6 was in growth, there’s been a quiet simmering of GTA 6 rumors within the background ever for the reason that launch of Grand Theft Auto V.
That simmering became a gradual boil when co-founder of Rockstar Video games and brother to Sam, Dan Houser, spoke in regards to the problem of satirizing the then-present day, stranger-than-fiction panorama: “[It’s] actually unclear what we’d even do with [Grand Theft Auto 6], not to mention how upset individuals would get with no matter we did.”
Dan Houser’s (most likely very trustworthy) deflections apart, with the abundance of rumors and insider experiences, it’s secure to imagine some model of GTA 6 was at all times in not less than pre-production at Rockstar for the reason that launch of Grand Theft Auto V. However we first heard reliably that GTA 6 was in growth from a 2020 Kotaku report, printed just a few brief months after the departure of Dan Houser from the studio.
Whereas this report was primarily centered on Rockstar’s office tradition, it talked about that the subsequent GTA sport was “early in growth,” one thing confirmed to IGN by an nameless supply near Rockstar Video games. The report additionally talked about a potential lower in scope to assist alleviate crunch, with bigger title and map updates to be launched at a future date.
Whereas a number of extra leaks and rumors would come up within the subsequent two years, it wasn’t till February 2022 that Rockstar despatched out a press launch asserting that growth on the subsequent GTA sport was “properly underway.” A decade’s price of smoke had lastly led to a really actual fireplace, and we had official affirmation from the studio.
First Particulars – The ‘Huge’ Report
Fortunately, the worst a part of the wait appeared to be over as extra information about Grand Theft Auto 6 began to drop fairly shortly quickly after. Our first concrete particulars of the sequel from outdoors of Rockstar had been reported by Bloomberg in July 2022, 5 months after Rockstar’s official announcement.
This report appeared to substantiate the altered scope of GTA 6, claiming that the sport would begin with one metropolis, Miami, with extra to be added later. Nevertheless it additionally talked about that map dimension could also be traded for density, as this new entry contained extra indoor places than any GTA sport beforehand.
The opposite huge element within the report was about its duo protagonists, a pair of financial institution robbers likened to Bonnie and Clyde. Not a lot was talked about in regards to the male protagonist, however the feminine was mentioned to be Latina. If true, this is able to be the primary feminine protagonist in a GTA sport for the reason that very first Grand Theft Auto, and the primary feminine protagonist in a totally 3D GTA sport created within the type we all know in the present day.
A lot of the Bloomberg report, just like the Kotaku one earlier than it, centered on the modifications in office construction that Rockstar had undergone since Purple Lifeless Redemption 2. A crackdown on crunch and the male-dominated office tradition appeared to be paying actual dividends for studio well being, however some had been pissed off with the dearth of progress the sport was making because of the addition of additional producers and bottlenecks within the workflow, resulting in many employees members departing the studio, and casting doubt on the assumed 2024 launch window.
Nonetheless, it appeared GTA 6 was certainly properly on its strategy to completion, barring any disaster.
Disaster – The Leak
On Sunday, September 18th and two months after the Bloomberg report, a large leak blew the event means of Grand Theft Auto 6 huge open. GTAForums consumer “teapotuberhacker” dropped 90 items of footage from the nonetheless unfinished mission, together with uncooked belongings and even sport code. These leaks coated every thing from fight to enemy behaviors and even totally voiced conversations. And whereas lots of the leaked supplies have been scrubbed from the web to the perfect of Take-Two Interactive’s capacity, the leaks confirmed the sooner experiences of the female and male protagonists, and the sport’s setting, Miami.
Rockstar themselves confirmed the hack’s legitimacy in a tweet the subsequent day, claiming that they might “correctly introduce… this subsequent sport when it’s prepared.” The FBI even bought concerned, as the identical hacking group appeared to be tied to the Uber, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Samsung hacks.
In July 2023 a teen was arrested along side a number of of those excessive profile hacks, together with Rockstar’s. However the harm to Rockstar had been achieved, as a lot of what was within the Bloomberg report earlier that 12 months had been seemingly confirmed.
A Message from Rockstar Video games pic.twitter.com/T4Wztu8RW8
— Rockstar Video games (@RockstarGames) September 19, 2022
Extra info from the leak included particulars in regards to the advances in lighting, just like the tech developed for Purple Lifeless 2, new techniques like Cash Laundering and Robberies (which would definitely match with the Bonnie and Clyde theme), and tiny particulars like raccoons going by means of your rubbish. However all of those had been leaks of a sport nonetheless distant from its closing launch, so all or none of it may very well be included within the closing product.
GTA On-line 2?
However what of GTA 6’s multiplayer? GTA On-line has develop into its personal entity separate from GTA 5, and remains to be going robust 10 years on. Rockstar’s guardian firm, Take-Two, filed a patent in 2021 that focuses on NPC conduct and particularly mentions “digital navigation and administration of objects in a multiplayer community gaming neighborhood.” So this might have huge implications for the way forward for multiplayer GTA. However the patent’s particulars additionally point out Xbox One and PS4 consoles, so this might have been simply one thing they had been implementing all through their work on GTA On-line.
Regardless, whether or not it’s an evolution of GTA On-line, a brand new iteration of it, or a extra built-in dovetail with GTA 6, the web element of GTA stays an unlimited potential money cow and one which Rockstar isn’t prone to ignore. It’s potential that with the addition of latest cities and missions, as is rumored, extra on-line parts will make their method into the normal single-player marketing campaign.
GTA 6 Launch Date and Platforms
Again in 2021, Tom Henderson reported rumors of a probable 2024 or 2025 launch date, a window that was then corroborated by Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier, and VGC’s Andy Robinson on Twitter. Quite a bit can change in two to a few years of growth, however in Could of this 12 months, Take-Two Interactive shared their projections for its fiscal 12 months 2025, a interval operating from April of 2024 to March 2025. In these projections had been some actually staggering numbers:
“In Fiscal 2025, we count on to enter this new period by launching a number of groundbreaking titles that we consider will set new requirements in our trade and allow us to attain over $8 billion in Web Bookings and over $1 billion in Adjusted Unrestricted Working Money Circulation.”
IGN’s personal Rebekah Valentine reported on the press launch, saying that the previous fiscal 12 months for Take-Two “reached $5.3 Billion – a document annual excessive… so to attain $8 billion Take-Two would want to make important acquisitions, or launch almost double the quantity of video games it traditionally has, or launch not less than one absolute behemoth of a sport.”
Given all of the earlier info, and Rockstar’s current trailer announcement, it appears we will lastly count on Grand Theft Auto 6 to launch someday subsequent 12 months, if not quickly after. So far as platforms are involved, it’s laborious to think about that as formidable as GTA video games often are, and as far into the PS5 and Xbox Sequence technology we’re, that we’ll see GTA 6 on the PS4 and Xbox One. However we’ll very doubtless ultimately have a PC model, even when it’s a staggered launch with the console variations as they did with GTA V.
We’re Lastly Getting GTA 6
It’s been a protracted street, however our first have a look at Grand Theft Auto 6 is nearly right here. We’ve been by means of each sort of information story conceivable, to studio restructuring, insane leaks, the departure of long-time studio heads, to even FBI Involvement within the investigation of cybercrime. And the craziest factor is that Rockstar hasn’t even known as it GTA 6 but. Solely “the subsequent Grand Theft Auto.” So they may actually be cooking up something!
However all these detours result in the identical place: the reveal trailer of what’s sure to be one of many largest video games of all time in early December.
