With November 19 getting closer by the day, Rockstar Games has finally pulled back the curtain on what it took to build Grand Theft Auto 6. The picture that emerges isn’t a smooth march toward launch – it’s a project that nearly doubled the studio in size, got cut down from a continent-spanning idea, and went through a stretch that staff themselves call the “dark period”.
Rockstar almost doubled in size – and it didn’t make things easier
Since Red Dead Redemption 2 shipped in 2018, Rockstar has grown from 2,441 employees to 4,711 spread across 12 offices. Essentially the whole company has been mobilized on GTA 6, yet more people didn’t automatically translate into faster progress. The gameplay systems, the story and the overall direction of the open world all had to line up at an extremely detailed level, and according to co-head of development Phil Hooker, the game only really started to take shape in 2022.
“The pattern is very familiar. You go through a period where things don’t work, but you see snippets,” Hooker said about the process.
From Project Americas to Leonida
The early version of the project, codenamed Project Americas, was far more ambitious in terms of geography – it was supposed to cover substantial chunks of both North and South America. That scope was eventually cut back to Vice City and the surrounding regions of Leonida, which is the game you’ll be buying in November.
Internally, the hardest stretch came when leadership couldn’t settle on a single vision for the game. Both delays are tied to those development challenges: the sheer complexity of the systems and the need for a convincing, densely populated world. Rockstar reportedly has an entire studio dedicated to nothing but the NPCs in GTA 6. If you want a sense of how much texture that world is supposed to have, we also covered the GTA 6 radio stations and what Rockstar said about Jason Duval.
Crunch, five days in the office and 34 dismissals
After the criticism Rockstar faced over crunch on Red Dead Redemption 2, the studio changed how it runs development – though some employees still describe periods of crunch. Another sticking point is attendance: Rockstar requires staff to work in person five days a week, citing security concerns. Management reportedly plans to revisit that policy once GTA 6 is out. Hanging over all of it is the recent dismissal of 34 employees amid a dispute over alleged union-busting.
What it means for you
Short term, it means Rockstar still has to drag its most ambitious open world over the finish line without trimming the level of detail players expect. Long term, developers reportedly expect the engine, tools and technology built for GTA 6 to make future games and extra content quicker to produce – which matters if you’re hoping the post-launch pipeline won’t take another eight years.
GTA 6 is still scheduled for November 19 and is listed on the official Rockstar page, with store listings live on both PlayStation and Xbox.
Where to go next
We’re tracking everything around the launch in our GTA news hub, and we’ve also written about the reported Xbox cloud streaming deal.
FAQ
Rockstar is still targeting November 19 for the release of Grand Theft Auto 6.
It was the early codename for GTA 6. The original plan called for a setting spanning substantial areas of North and South America, before the scope was reduced to Vice City and the surrounding regions.
It’s the internal name for a difficult stretch of development when leadership struggled to settle on a clear vision for the game. Co-head of development Phil Hooker says GTA 6 only really took shape in 2022.
The studio has grown from 2,441 employees in 2018 to 4,711 across 12 offices, with essentially the entire company working on GTA 6.
Rockstar changed how it develops games after the criticism around Red Dead Redemption 2, but some employees still report periods of crunch. Staff also have to be in the office five days a week, a policy management reportedly wants to revisit after launch.