Grand Theft Auto 6 leaks are part of its story

With simply over 24 hours left earlier than Rockstar Games was set to debut its first Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer, a grainy video began circulating on-line: The GTA 6 trailer, however marked with a large bitcoin watermark. About half-hour later Rockstar did the company equal of saying “Fuck it,” importing the trailer and pointing to it in a terse put up on X: “Our trailer has leaked so please watch the real thing on YouTube.”

It’s uncommon for a corporation like Rockstar to ignore its unique, introduced schedule and simply put up the factor, but it surely’s not the primary time it’s occurred. When The Last of Us Part 2’s PlayStation 5 remaster was leaked early on the PlayStation Store by information miners in search of new data, hours later, an official trailer popped up on YouTube, with a number of outstanding Naughty Dog builders declaring that “leaks really suck.” (In Naughty Dog’s case, nonetheless, timing for The Last of Us Part 2’s remaster wasn’t introduced, and it’s doable the YouTube launch was its deliberate time.)

Typically, within the occasion of a leak, an organization begins issuing takedown requests as rapidly as doable — which Rockstar did, of course — and waits it out till the deliberate debut. (We’ve seen this a lot of occasions when Pokémon video games leak early; Nintendo and The Pokémon Company attempt to take issues down, however don’t acknowledge leaks head-on.) In the case of GTA 6, the early launch of the trailer hasn’t diluted the hype, with the GTA 6 trailer reaching greater than 85 million views by Tuesday morning. It’s rapidly gaining on Rockstar’s debut Grand Theft Auto 5 trailer, which was printed on Nov. 2, 2011, and has greater than 99 million views.

Image: Rockstar Studios/Rockstar Games

Several Rockstar workers have expressed their upset emotions in regards to the leak: “This fucking sucks,” one developer posted to X. (The put up, and the developer’s X account, have since been deleted.) The GTA 6 trailer wasn’t the primary online game trailer to be leaked, and it undoubtedly received’t be the final in an web panorama the place everybody from followers to manufacturers is all the time combating for eyeballs.

For higher or worse, leaks have already turn into a part of GTA 6’s journey to its launch — one thing that’s comparatively on theme, as Rockstar’s upcoming sport seemingly takes on the battle for web fame.

Grand Theft Auto is one of the online game business’s most profitable properties, which makes it a scorching goal for hackers and potential leaks. GTA 5 was launched 10 years in the past, and other people have been salivating ever since on the prospect of the sixth entry within the sequence. Rockstar has been quiet about GTA 6 for many of the previous 10 years; the studio didn’t acknowledge the sport was in improvement till February 2022. Later that 12 months, GTA 6 made historical past as Rockstar’s builders had been topic to 1 of the most important leaks in fashionable online game historical past.

On Sept. 18, 2022, a hacker printed greater than 90 movies — roughly an hour’s value of footage — from the in-development sport. The leak was, and nonetheless is, unprecedented as a result of of its sheer scope, the extent of anticipation for the sport in query, and as a result of of how uncommon it’s for followers to see enormous elements of a AAA online game in a visibly unfinished state. The leaked footage depicted a GTA 6 that was clearly in improvement, with debug instruments, blocked-out environments, and all.

Image: Rockstar Studios/Rockstar Games

The hacker claimed to have accessed Rockstar’s inner Slack, which is an software workplaces use to speak and share information. A United Kingdom courtroom discovered {that a} U.Ok.-based 18-year-old, Arion Kurtaj, was largely answerable for the hack. Kurtaj had been beforehand arrested for different hacking incidents carried out in affiliation with infamous group Lapsus$, and he was out on bail when he went after Rockstar, Uber, and Revolut. Kurtaj’s hack of Rockstar was the final one he managed earlier than he was caught once more in a Travelodge resort that he had been put up in following considerations for his security (he was beforehand doxxed by “rival hackers,” in line with the BBC). Kurtaj and a second 17-year-old hacker had been discovered responsible in August. The BBC reported that the prosecution’s lead barrister on the case, Kevin Barry, stated the hackers had been motivated by “notoriety,” “financial gain,” and “amusement.”

The injury had been accomplished; many followers couldn’t resist the peek backstage earlier than the true present started. The hourlong clips within the leak gave keen GTA 6 followers quite a bit of materials to work by way of, and by September of this 12 months, the neighborhood had put collectively a 60-page doc outlining each single element from the leak.

Rockstar introduced in November that it could put up a trailer in December, information that was first reported by Bloomberg and rapidly confirmed by Rockstar. Last week, Rockstar lastly introduced a date for the trailer: Dec. 5. In the lead-up to the trailer drop date, a number of fast movies had been uploaded to TikTok purporting to indicate elements of the GTA 6 Vice City map; the video clips, which rapidly unfold, gave the impression to be recordings of a pc display. The supply and credibility of these uploads stays unconfirmed, however they do appear to match the cityscapes we’ve now seen within the reputable trailer. Somewhere alongside the way in which, rumors began circulating that the leak got here from a Rockstar worker’s son, however Polygon is unable to confirm these claims. It’s unattainable to inform, of course, whether or not the TikTok leaks got here from the identical supply as Dec. 4’s trailer leak.

GTA 6’s legacy of leaks not solely has an impression on how the neighborhood sees the sport, but it surely’s one thing that impacts builders, too. Rockstar is famously secretive — or maybe notoriously so — and leaks are typically thought-about a uncommon look backstage for followers, or perhaps a triumph for transparency. Unfortunately, although, leaks can typically have the alternative impact. Speaking to Wired in 2022, a AAA developer stated leaking can tighten issues up much more, making the business extra opaque — even inside studios themselves. Sometimes, a “trust vacuum” varieties between departments as studios examine leaks internally, Wired reported. The participant expertise will not often, if ever, be considerably altered by a leaked trailer or gameplay video, however the identical can’t be stated for the individuals making a leaked sport.