Image: Rockstar Games
A GTAForums user who claims to have also been behind the recent Uber hack has just released nearly 100 videos online that he claims show development footage of Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto VI, which is currently circulating on nearly every platform of social networks.
Coinciding with much of what Bloomberg reported earlier this year, including the fact that the game will co-star a woman and be set in Vice City, the videos are largely stills in development, with unfinished textures and models throughout and code playback. in real time in many of them. The filter is currently taking requests to ask people what else they would like to see in more videos.
In one, a white male playable character meets a racist NPC by the pool, and as the conversation unfolds, you can see the code necessary for the interaction playing alongside the game’s action. In another, the female character—I only specify it that way because it would be a series first—explores one of the series’ infamous strip clubs.
This appears to be the new female protagonist of GTA 6, which is technically a series first, and all the more reason why a leak of this caliber for one of the most anticipated games in history is so unprecedented for Rockstar Games. Screenshot: teapotuberhacker / Rockstar
There’s also a video showing “passenger shooting mechanics”, illustrated with the player carrying an AK-47 at some chasing police cars, and another showing the interior modeling of a car.
One of the more comprehensive videos uploaded shows the two characters teaming up to rob a restaurant, holding patrons at gunpoint before the police arrive. Others are cruder in form and feature little more than a featureless positional character moving across an empty landscape depicting combat animations as cover.
The legitimacy of these videos is obviously in question. There are certainly a lot of images, and simulating both the action and the code running at the same time would be a lot of work for an internet joke. But it’s still a leak, and unless Rockstar comments (we’ve reached out and will update if we hear back), we won’t know it’s real until we can match what’s shown here to what eventually appears in GTA VI.
If it’s real, then shit. Given the state of the game and the amount of footage, it would be one of the greatest of all time, right up there with Half-Life 2. So far, though, it looks legit: not only are journalists like ex- giant of Kotaku Jason. With Rockstar contacts confirming the information to them, Schreier said Rockstar employees appear to be liking tweets related to the apparent hack. But the wildest part?
The hacker is trying to reach a deal with Rockstar right now, though we don’t know what kind. To stop distributing more material? To ensure that the filter is not sued? Either way, this is without a doubt one of the most unprecedented leaks in all of video game history.
Earlier this year, Bloomberg also reported that the next GTA would try to be more “culturally sensitive,” a more subtle shift in tone that has already been evident in the re-release of GTA V. The recent game saw Rockstar removed some transphobic content that had previously been criticized by some fans.
While things are moving fast on the hacking front and rumors are circulating about potential scams involving the sale of source code, fans are busy trying to figure out what’s visible in the footage that’s already out there. There are already theories about who plays the new protagonist.
Update 1:55 p.m.: Added details on the leaker’s shout-out to Rockstar, along with new developments in the story.
Update 19:10: Added more details about GTA 6.