We have a lot to talk about today. Recently, I sat down with Jason Schreier, who is one of the most respected journalists in the game industry, but who most notably for this video has a history of both praising and criticizing Rockstar Games. Now, Jason was recently invited out to Rockstar North, where he got to see the game like I did, but also chat with a bunch of the game's lead developers, Rob Nelson, Aaron Garbut, Phil Hooker, and a bunch more. So, in this video, not only are we going to be talking about a bunch of new GTA 6 info coming from Jason's story, but I'm also going to be showing you highlights from my recent conversation with Jason, and we're going to find out what GTA 6's development was actually like. There's some really cool stuff in this video, so if you enjoy, leave a thumbs up, subscribe for more stuff like this, let's jump in. How's your channel going, by the way? I've seen you you've been killing it one take Schreier. >> >> Thanks, man. It's been going okay. I haven't had much time to like even do videos recently cuz I've been so busy doing stuff. Uh I was like traveling around the world. I was in Japan for a week, and then flew back to New York, and then flew to Scotland to do this Rockstar thing, and so it's been it's been a lot, but yeah, but it's going well. No, I'm really pleased that people seem to be enjoying it. >> Yeah, I mean like I saw I'm I've been big into Destiny 2, so I've seen Paul Tassi doing I guess a somewhat similar thing, and he's been killing it, so yeah, it's cool to see you all doing it now. It It's It's just yeah, the modernization, I guess, of journalism now. It's It's cool to to see a more personal side of you, I guess, in terms of >> It's interesting, man. I feel like it's a little depressing that people don't want to read, they just want to watch things, but I guess I it's my job to deliver to that if need be. Who am I to say what the people should want? >> Now, Jason starts off his story by talking about the development of GTA 6 in its early days. Specifically, Rockstar taking trips to Miami itself and what they did there. So, he says they rode with police to criminal hotspots, craned out of helicopters to snap aerial shots, and weave through crowds of scantily clad dancers at the hottest nightclubs in town, all so they could evaluate the lighting. "Designing a club for a typical video game might mean generating a few NPCs in different colored shirts," says Aaron Garbut. "In GTA 6 though, it means animating and scripting each individual patron, creating drinks, adding music, crafting lighting, matching the music to that lighting, and composing all other layers and layers and layers of detail that make a virtual club feel as authentic as possible. And now you understand why it took so long," says Jennifer Kolbe, Rockstar's head of publishing. Jason Schreier goes on to talk about his time at Rockstar North last month and what he saw. But instead of reading this out, let's just hear what Jason told me directly. Yeah, what was your day like? You spent a whole day there pretty much, you said. >> Yeah, um I uh spent most of it in Rob's office, which is ridiculous. Um I don't know if you saw his balcony. We had lunch out on his balcony, um which >> So, he has this balcony. So, his office So, Rockstar's office, Rockstar North, which is the kind of the the the the brain trust, the center of of uh the the creative decision-making for Rockstar, they're in Edinburgh, Scotland, which is this quaint little city that is like full of ancient castles and churches and >> the bottom of a mountain. >> Mhm. >> Yeah, it's so pretty, my god. >> So, Rockstar's office is this three-floor building. Used to be a newspaper called The Scotsman, and then Rockstar took it over a few years ago, um maybe like a decade or two ago, and uh and Rob's office is on the third floor. It's a suite. It's got this kind of big living room-style area with um these two TV monitors, and then a couple of desks, and a big couch, and that's where he plays builds of the game. Then there's another section that is more of his like personal office area with his big desk and and whatnot and shelves. And then outside of that office is a big balcony with a table and chairs and all sorts of looks like you had a big It looks like a a patio on someone's house where you would have barbecues and parties out there. And this balcony has a view of the Scottish Crags, and you can just look at the this massive mountain. It is stunning the view of of the Scottish mountains from that office. Um so yeah, so I spent most of my time in his office. I got a tour of the rest of the office, too. I saw the all the different monitors that they have. I saw a big monitor with all the bug tracking that they have. Um a lot more green than red, which was a good sign at the time. I was like, well, guess it's not going to get delayed again. Um and uh I did watch him play uh through some stuff in the game for like half hour or so. Um I specifically wanted to see the kind of the big new feature that they were really um pushing and promoting and and saying they were really excited about, which is Jason and Lucia, the two main characters, working together in free roam, doing stuff together in free roam. >> Mhm. >> And the reason they're really excited, did you see this stuff when you were there, too? Like them doing free roam stuff together? >> Yep, yep. >> The reason they're really excited about that is cuz um that's not something that like a game has ever really done before. Like we've seen games with companions and like different like, you have a main player like, I don't know, BioShock Infinite and you have Elizabeth keeping you company or The Last of Us with Joel and Ellie. Um but that's very scripted and very tight and like the the designers know exactly what's going to happen at any time. In this game, you can be playing as Jason, and so I'll I'll tell you that exactly what I saw. You You're playing as Jason, um you can text Lucia and say, "Hey, come on over, hang out. Are you busy?" And she's like, "Be there in a few minutes." And so you wait a few minutes, she pops up, um and then uh Rob was playing. He wouldn't let me pick up the controller. I was like, "Can I play?" He was like, "No, not today." >> Yeah, of course I asked. Of course I asked. >> Yeah. See, I didn't ask, and I was like, "Would you have let me do it?" But I I think the answer is probably >> Well, actually, I asked him uh and he looked at the marketing head, Mark, and Mark was like, "No, we're not doing that." Um uh so I I uh I asked him if I could control everyone, let me. So, but so he showed me what was happening. And so, Jason and Lucia, they were walking together in the park. Um they would hold hands and this like bespoke scripted comment or not scripted, this bespoke conversation started playing. That was like really fascinating piece of lore. Um it was there's a big spoiler in there, so I'm not going to share that. I promised them I wouldn't share it. He was like, "We happened to get the one conversation that was like a spoiler." I was like, "Okay, I won't I won't tell anyone this." And I was like, "This is This is just a totally optional random little conversation we had and it adds so much to this." >> So, that's what Jason saw when he was there. We'll get more into exactly what he saw in a little bit, but that's what he was doing. We also compared notes on going to Rockstar because the whole thing was kind of bizarre. But, actually, I'm curious >> to hear about your story, too. Maybe we can both we can each tell our stories. Was it Yours was in July. Were there a lot of influencers there? I know like Kind of Funny was there. I know IGN had a person there. I know IGN >> IGN, yeah. Yeah. For me, it was it was a one-on-one thing. Um so, we all went at separate times. >> Oh, okay. >> I think I was there July 10th, first or second week of July. Uh but this is something that I first heard about in May. That's when that was getting floated around. Uh I was told I was going to be the only English-speaking influencer there. And IGN, Kind of Funny, that, you know, I guess that's the more journalist side of things, but uh So, that was that was quite bizarre. Had to keep that under wraps for about 2 months and then another month and a half after that before the uh embargo lifted. Uh so, it was it was a lot, but the entire experience, man, it's it's so un-Rockstar-like. Inviting I had 3 hours with them, mainly with Rob and and some other members of the team. I didn't get to speak to everyone that you spoke to. Um but we sat down, we watched uh the extended look, which was they called it trailer three at the time when I when it was introduced to me. Um and then you had just two and a half hours of of Rob with the controller next to me in his office and and just doing whatever we wanted in the game. Yeah, three hours of basically one-on-one stuff and I didn't even know until I went into the room what I was there for. I've never seen something so secretive. Uh it was it was bizarre. But now let's actually dive into the early development stage of GTA 6. Because this is where Jason's story gets pretty interesting. This is stuff we haven't heard before. In 2015, Nelson and a group of other top staff flew to Miami for their first research trip. They had ambitious goals for GTA 6, which they code-named Project Americas, because they aimed to feature big swaths of land across both North and South America. Later, that would be cut down to Miami and its surroundings. The hope was to develop the game concurrently with Red Dead Redemption 2, which was helmed by the San Diego office. But as that game's ambitions grew, Nelson realized he needed to mobilize most of Rockstar, including the senior leadership, to help finish it. That meant pushing GTA 6 back several years. But the benefit was that everything they built could pay off when we get to the game, Nelson says. In the past, Rockstar had juggled multiple games simultaneously across different offices. Now, the bulk of the company staff would be focused on just one project at a time. So, that's interesting, right? Like in 2015, that is when we can assume production technically started for GTA 6. At least that's when the research trips started happening. I personally wouldn't count that and then probably up to like 2018 as full development years. But still, it's interesting to know that even years before Red Dead 2, they were doing trips and developing GTA 6, but then had to scale GTA 6 back to get Red Dead finished. Kind of cool. One of the auto one of the stories that I remember most you you referenced it a bit earlier was I it was early 2020 uh when Rockstar was initially planning on having North and South America. These were the the Project Americas days they were calling it back then, I believe. Uh interesting that I mean >> call it that. That's the code name of the of the game is Americas. >> Interesting. Interesting. After Red Dead Redemption 2, several top staff departed including Rockstar's co-founder Dan Houser, who'd been the lead writer for most of the company's games. As a result, Nelson saw his role expand. He and two other veterans, Phil Hooker and Aaron Garbut, all received the title head of development, reflecting their supervisory roles. Nelson and Garbut were also studio heads of the Edinburgh office. This sort of arrangement is unusual for video game development. It's far more common for a single director to run the show. The three leaders say their day-to-day jobs didn't change much as they supervised teams and filled in gaps as they did for the last game. But some staff griped that there were too many cooks in the kitchen, complaining about indecision and conflicting visions. "But nobody ever really said directly to me, it's really annoying having three of you make decisions," Nelson says, "but I'm aware that people would say that." He adds that the same problems emerge when a game has just a single leader. "But they may be slow in making decisions," he says. "They may change their mind all the had figured out the skeleton of the story, which would feature a criminal couple named Jason Duval and Lucia Carmenos as they robbed their way through the seedy underbelly of fake Miami. But determining GTA 6's other fundamentals proved time-consuming for the three leaders. Some elements were no-brainers. Just like previous GTA games, this would be a satirical open-world action game in which you could hijack cars and get into shootouts with both cops and criminals. But the contours of the design were tricky to define. Just how true to life would this fictional Miami be? That's super interesting to me, man. It was 2019, the end of 2019, that the skeleton of the story was in place. A lot of us thought that this had been done way before that. And that was right before COVID, too. So Yeah, and look, it makes sense why this game has taken so long, I will say. This is an interesting read. One of the things you said in that story was the GTA 6 could be, uh let's say, a bit more of a moderate-sized game, I think were the words you used. Uh and they would plan to expand uh the map over time. Have you heard any more relating to that or what Rockstar's plans are in the future? Because you finished your story uh that's that's out when this will go live. Uh >> Yeah. >> maybe giving a bit of insight into what Rockstar could be doing uh in the future, which we'll talk about, too. But in terms of that um expansion and expanding the game over time, have you have you heard anything else on that? >> So, yeah. So, first of all, moderately sized release definitely did not turn out to be the case. >> No, that Yeah, that one was a bit off. >> I think that well, so I think that was a conversation in 2020, and then I think at that point they were talking about releasing the game like within 3 or 4 years after that. So, I think we saw what happened. The game grew and expanded. And another thing that's interesting, I think, and and worth noting here is that so, I mentioned in my Bloomberg story that um there was a lot of time spent just kind of figuring out what the game would look like, figuring out um uh what how realistic it would be, how how detailed each different feature would be. I bring up in my Bloomberg story, the current story, um uh just as an example, like if you're going to the store to buy a can of beer or buy a a box of beer, um do you have to go and get the beer from the fridge and then bring it to the cashier and then pay for it, or can you just buy it directly from there? And like, how realistic does that have to be? >> me that they did actually have that at one point. Yeah, that that was the plan. Uh >> Yeah, well, so that's that's what I'm getting at is that they spent all this time just like prototyping all these different permutations and like trying to figure out how it worked. And so, at the same time that they were doing this, there were still thousands of people working on the game, and what they were doing was just building stuff and like making the map bigger and making new stuff and making insides of buildings, and like building new locations. And so the game kind of naturally expanded and expanded and expanded. So I think plans to do a moderately sized release in 2020, I think uh those went went by the wayside um when when it became clearer that that this game was going to take a lot longer than they anticipated. And by the way, that was also a plan um before COVID, and COVID threw a wrench into everything. Um took added extra time to pretty much every production, but this one in particular because COVID hit just as they were trying to figure out what the game was actually going to look like. >> That's an interesting snippet, I think, because this shows while Rockstar was trying to figure out what should and shouldn't be in the game, how realistic the game really should be, the rest of the team was busy expanding the rest of the map, right? The rest of the game. So the game kept getting bigger and bigger. Uh and there's another example in the article that I thought was interesting here. To make a stat-boosting sandwich in your apartment, would you have to go to a grocery store and buy the ingredients, or could you simply go prepare a sandwich? Making each of these decisions required a lot of guesswork because so much of the game wasn't finished yet. When I was at Rockstar North, one of the things Rob said to me that I sort of mentioned with Jason there, was that they were weighing that up, right? Like should you actually have to go to the grocery store and buy all of this stuff? And what I thought was interesting was your reaction to it, like in the comments, because it was pretty mixed. A lot of you were like, "Yeah. Yeah, I want to go to a grocery store." Which I find kind of bizarre. We've got different types of GTA fans that want the game to go in different directions. So it's a bit of a tricky decision for Rockstar to make, I think. You know, even something like fuel had a similar discussion, right? Like a lot of people really are excited for fuel, and a lot of you guys hate the idea. Anyway, back to the article. Rockstar was trying to figure all of this out as COVID was hitting. As Nelson, Garbut, and Hooker tried to figure out what GTA 6 would actually be, the company began to run into other obstacles. The pandemic drove everybody home for months, tanking productivity across the industry, and forcing Rockstars performance capture studios to halt work entirely. A surge of hiring made it tougher to communicate across the company. Some senior designers grew frustrated and quit, tired of what they felt was a lack of progress. "But trying to keep a team together through that is really challenging." Nelson says. "I can imagine how I would feel if I was sitting somewhere in a studio and looking at this thing day after day and seeing it not come together. It's starting to go, is it ever going to come together?" "What everyone needed," Nelson says, "was trust, faith, just like Jason and Lucia. It is okay," he says. "We're going to get through it." This is cool, man. This is stuff we wanted to know about for so long. I find this stuff super interesting. Hearing about people leaving, the lack of progress, because as fans, we were feeling the same thing, right? One of the reasons people love Grand Theft Auto is that each entry contains several games worth of stuff to do. From braids and robbery to barbell squats. For GTA 6, Nelson and the other directors wanted to let the two protagonists do everything together in the open world. This would require complicated artificial intelligence systems, the traditional kind, not chat GPT, and a ton of complexities that would take years to work out. "But there's trepidation about taking that on," Nelson says. "Then you have certain people advocating for it. We need this. This is a game about a couple. They have to be a couple. And so we had to commit to that." So we heard Jason talk about that walk in the park between Jason and Lucia earlier. Uh this is what Rob showed him after that. >> Then he um had them go drive, like picked out a store, a jewelry store, or something, or I don't remember what kind of store it was. Um cased it out, said, "Okay, there are three security guards here, and maybe we don't want to do this one now. Um we're going to go to the gym." He would took us to the gym. Jason starts doing squats while Lucia goes and does the treadmill. >> You get your two for one. What are you showing me? >> What's up? >> You get your two for one. Taking both together and then you get your two for one. Taking both together and then you get >> The idea of it is like what's cool to me about that stuff is um just that Lucia will just kind of organically interact with everything you're doing, which is not something I think we've ever seen in a video game before where you have one player doing stuff and the second one will just kind of go along and have conversations with you and just interact with everything you're doing along the way, whether it's like getting robbing a bank and getting into a police shootout or just like going to the gym or going to the grocery store or something. So that's very different and interesting. >> There's another detail in Jason's follow-up as well that I thought was pretty cool. When Lucia shows up, Rob presses a button to kiss her. Then while they're walking through the park, he presses another button to have them hold hands, which I would assume was R2 like we saw in the extended look. So you're actually choosing to do these things. We knew about holding hands, but we didn't know about the kissing. So I yeah, that's that's optional while you're hanging out I guess, which I mean, yeah, pretty cool. After some bantering, they went for a drive then to the gym. Lucia ran on the treadmill while Jason did squats. Then to a bank to see if it was worth robbing. No, he decided, too many guards. To an ATM to drop off some cash. What your cash is vulnerable. We tried to make money mean more than it ever has. And back to the office of what I think was a gas station. Where he disarmed an alarm and stole a bunch of money without alerting anyone. Quote, there's so many of these little interiors, hundreds of them, that you can go and explore. So hundreds of interiors and money actually matters a lot more this time. Those are two things that I did get from Rob as well, but I didn't actually have confirmation like a quote from the transcript about the hundreds of interiors. So it's nice to finally get that there are hundreds of interiors. Then Jason talks about what happened when they tried to get a haircut. So at one point, Nelson was planning on taking Jason and Lucia to the salon to get a haircut, but he accidentally ran into some not so friendly pedestrians, triggering a brawl and leading someone to call the cops. Plans derailed, he took the criminal couple on a drive to flee the scene. The wanted system, a mode when the cops are chasing you, is a little more complicated than in previous games, Nelson told me. The police knew that the culprits were a couple, so they could steer clear by splitting up and fleeing separately. Most of that is stuff we kind of already knew, but let's switch to the story and the humor of GTA 6 because this has been a talking point for sure. Then there's the game itself. Rockstar titles are always acclaimed, but can differ wildly in tone. GTA 5 came out in 2013 at the beginning of the second Obama administration, and its revelment in nihilism served as a counterweight to that era's earnestness. Five years later, Red Dead 2 told a much more nuanced story with an emphasis on realism, sometimes at the expense of fun. GTA 6 tries to find a balance between the two, but it seems to look far more towards the latter title for inspiration. A game in which you can still throw $20 bills at strippers and mow down pedestrians, but one that also wants you to empathize with its Bonnie and Clyde-styled protagonists. >> Um I will say, speaking personally, uh so I I liked GTA 5. I thought it was exhausting. The nihilism of it was a little much for me. Um and the characters are just so unlikable that it's like I I tried replaying it a couple of weeks ago, and I was just like, "This is This is tough. This is exhausting." Um Franklin and Lamar are yelling at each other. >> qualities, those guys. >> Exactly. And they're all just They They all just hate each other. Um playing a game now where like And then I So, actually, to finish that thought, so Red Dead 2 I really liked um because that Arthur Morgan was such a good character, and that story played out so beautifully. I really just enjoyed every minute of it. Um uh uh could do without a lot of the realistic open-world stuff that isn't like my particular jam, but for me, the story was really compelling. And now what I'm what I'm really excited about with 6 is that Jason and Lucia like actually feel like these real people instead of these ridiculous cartoons like Franklin and Michael and Trevor. And um I'm excited to see their relationship unfold. It seems like they actually enjoy spending time together, which is cool to see. Um so, for me personally, the stuff in the open world, I mean, I'm sure I'll play around with of plenty, but like that doesn't interest me so much as the actual story and watching Jason and Lucia just like go navigate this world and seeing how that all that unfolds, that to me is really exciting because it feels like they've taken a lot more from Red Dead 2 than they did from GTA 5 when it comes to storytelling and writing. >> Yeah, one of the things you said in your story is, you know, not only is Rockstar grown up, but the games have as well. And I think a lot of everything you've just said explains that so perfectly. The characters, well, one of the main things people have concerned about is the humor and the satire within within GTA 6. I don't know that if you create a game that has the same tone as GTA 5 now that it would work necessarily as well. >> Different tone. >> Especially coming, yeah, exactly. Especially coming from from Red Dead 2. A bit more of a a grounded approach and and treating treating players differently is so important for them this time around. So many things that Rob showed me, his his explanation for why certain things were the way that they are in the game is it needs to fit this resolution. It needs to fit this era. Not just in terms of let's say like physical animations and mechanics and whatnot, but everything within the game. They're treating the players like adults this time around. Every system that's in the game requires, I guess, a little bit more thought, a little bit more time. Even like you said, you you heard a big lore drop in a a random conversation. That's going to be completely optional. That's going to be completely up to the player. You don't even Jason and Lucia don't even need to be a romantic couple if you don't want them to be, which is just bizarre. What a bizarre concept. >> Red Dead 2 did similar things where like suddenly you get some big piece of lore like in a camp party or something like that. Um, which is cool. Yeah, it's super cool. Yeah, as far as the humor, I think a lot of people have kind of seized upon one thing that I wrote a few years ago, which is I wrote that Rockstar is um I think I wrote this in 2022 in a Bloomberg piece because >> you're talking about. >> Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. I wrote that um Rockstar was going through all these cultural changes. They had eliminated They had um canceled this cops and crooks pack for GTA online because of um the uh Black Lives Matter protest in the summer of 2020 and all this other stuff. And one thing I wrote was that they're avoiding They're trying to avoid punching down. And so, for example, they've removed like transphobic this transphobic line from our joke from previous uh from GTA 5 um like in in patches and updates and stuff like that. Um and I think a lot of people seized upon that and were like, "Oh, Rockstar's getting rid of their humor. They're going woke." or whatever. >> Mhm. >> Um which I think is kind of a a complete overreaction to what is actually happening because punching down, I mean, essentially what that means is just kind of like um picking on like uh people who are the weak, like weak people or minorities or people who are not or like disenfranchised for no reason. And by that, I mean stuff like just kind of random like transphobic jokes that have no purpose in the game. This is still going to be a ridiculous game. This is still going to be like over-the-top Miami. And in fact, one of the things I'm like most worried about actually is uh is like um having to spend so much time in Florida cuz Florida is such an exhausting place for so many reasons. And this is such an over-the-top caricature of Florida. But I don't know. How can you watch that 27-minute um uh premiere footage and think that the humor is not going to be there? Like it's still ridiculous. And I'm sure some of it is still >> I think those that all starts to go away if you've really been paying attention to to a lot of the previews and stuff that that have happened. >> Yeah, exactly. >> the people that are doing this rage bait and whatever it is online As someone who I think I know a lot about the game. I've watched every preview. I've had a preview myself. They say a lot of things that are that are actually just wrong. >> Yeah. Yeah. And I actually think there's still going to be plenty of humor that is like juvenile and puerile and isn't for adults that is like kind of like teenager humor, which is fine. I mean, that's what GTA is. Um one of the reasons I'm more interested in this game than like I'm one of the reasons I'm very interested in what this game is going to do is cuz to me it feels like it's doing almost like a best of both worlds. It's like combining this very adult story with this very childish sensibility and world. And I suspect that the story itself is going to be really interesting and engaging in ways that like you might um not get the same like watching one of the TV commercials or listening to a radio show. It might just be stupid. And sometimes it'll be smart, I'm sure. I'm sure there'll be like great Joe Rogan parodies in there also. But I'm sure some of it is going to be super dumb. Um which a lot of people like. >> just got him. I mean, I don't know if you've been seeing that. >> I mean, that would be a little much. That would be a little much. That would be crazy. I will say I saw that they had podcasts in the game. Um they did not ask my podcast Triple Click to be in the game. I can confirm that that we are not in there. There is still time, yes. Still a few weeks left. >> Yeah. No, I look in terms of the the humor I would like look, some previewers said that they had seen a naked guy walking around just roaming on the street. I know the kind of funny guys said they ran into a cop chase where there was a police helicopter saying there's a furry in the area. And uh you can even you can even find the furry. I I saw Robert, by the way, one of the funniest things you can imagine. I saw Robert try to rob a store that was covered in feet pics all across >> >> the entire uh room. And he was searching for the code and the code was like feet cock boobs or something. And he he needed to That was what a bizarre experience. >> Yeah, how can anyone say this all this game is going It's going to be so crude. it's going to be so woke. That's ridiculous. I think that like like you can still do satire and absurd humor and sexual humor and gross out humor without just like picking on like transgender people for no reason. Like you can you can just approach it in a in a way that isn't mean-spirited. And that's the thing about GTA 5 is it often felt mean-spirited in a way that I don't think benefited the game. And that was a product of its time, but still I think today I think 2013 was so interesting. It's this is like the first Obama or sorry, the beginning of the second Obama administration. This is a time of like earnestness and like people really caring about politics and other stuff or it was really it was made it came out in 2013. So it was really made in like the late 2000s, a time of like yes we can and change and hope. And that that this the game GTA 5 was kind of a counterweight to that. And now we're in a time where cynicism abounds and our entire culture is just built on just people being horrible to one another, especially here in America. It's just our entire government is just people who are outwardly just being as crude as possible. And so to have a game that maybe doesn't do that, I think feels like more of a of a of a response to the times, of a game that we need right now. >> A game that's built on on trust rather than >> Trust, yeah. Trust. >> Yeah, interesting. Now we're going to talk about the actual people making the game. What is it actually like making a game like this? Uh because after Red Dead 2, Rockstar copped a lot of flak for stuff like crunch culture, all of this stuff. And after Red Dead 2, Rockstar said things needed to change. When it came out in October 2018, Red Dead 2 became a flashpoint for conversation surrounding work-life balance at Rockstar. To build their sprawling detailed worlds, developers at the studio had to put in long hours working nights and weekends for extensive periods as part of a process that the game industry calls crunch, for many staff, Red Dead 2 had been an improvement over previous projects, but it still meant months of 60-hour work weeks. Even before the public controversy, Red Dead 2's development was, quote, a real moment for Rockstar to look at itself, says Kolbe, the head of publishing. We all looked at each other and said, we're not doing it again like this. In emails and conversations with employees, she and other leaders at Rockstar vowed that the next GTA would be different. But, I said we're not going to finish this game by crunching, Kolbe recalls. Throwing more people at the game was one solution. Recalibrating expectations for the speed of tasks was another, as was more rigorous scheduling and monitoring of progress. Rockstar also implemented policies offering paid time off in exchange for extra hours worked and in some cases additional pay. But, it's not been perfect, but it's certainly better than Red Dead 2 was, Kolbe says. Anytime I say we haven't crunched, someone's going to say, I did, and I don't want to get into arguments with individual teams or individual people. But, I think we did things differently and I'm proud of that. And I want to get Jason's take on that because, you know, it's one thing if it's coming from Rockstar themselves, but I wanted to get Jason's actual thoughts because he spoke to a lot of people at Rockstar over the years. Do you think Rockstar is moving in the right direction? Do you think they've sort of started to and are continuing to achieve those those goals that they set out around 2018 in terms of getting rid of the bro culture, reducing the crunch? >> Yeah, so those are two very different things, I would say. Um, as far as crunch, I think that's a lot harder to eliminate. I would definitely not say that they eliminated crunch on this project. Like, there were definitely people at the company who crunched on this project. I think they did some things that make that better. For one, they implemented this new policy that, essentially, you get time off in lieu of your extra time worked. So, like, for every extra hour you put in, um, you'll get that in PTO, at least in theory. Hopefully, people actually get to execute on that when the game comes out. But, um, but that's one big thing that I think helps make up for crunch in a lot of ways because one of the problems with crunch is that it's like if you're on an annual salary, then you're not getting paid for your crunch a lot of the time. So, getting vacation time in lieu of that, I think helps make up for it. Also, in some cases like if they had a certain people hit a certain threshold of hours worked, they'll also get paid a little bit extra for that time, too. So, that I think makes a big deal. But yes, people were definitely putting in overtime on this project. I think that when it comes to crunch, I think it's more important I think trying to eliminate overtime is kind of I mean, ideal ideally, sure, but like that's not really a realistic thing to do. I think it's more about eliminating crunch culture, which is kind of a a little bit more amorphous, but like there are ways you can do that. Putting in managers who don't have certain expectations. In Rockstar's case, in this on this project specifically, building more of a production team and doing more rigorous scheduling on this game, I think helped with that sort of thing. There was also I I mentioned this in the in my reporting at Kotaku back in the day, but there was always this philoso- this like kind of I don't know, accepted wisdom that like if Sam and Dan Houser, the co-founders of the company, are coming to town, you better be in your seats on the weekend cuz they like to see people in their seats on the weekend. Like that to me is the epitome of like crunch culture, which is the thing you want to Very different than kind of crunch. And also, as far as I know, well, actually I I shouldn't say this cuz there are 4,700 people, and so I can't really speak. I haven't talked to all 4,700 people. I can't speak to like what it was like in every single office or on every single discipline or team. But I certainly haven't heard of any cases where people said, "We are mandating crunch for the next 5 months, and you have to be in the office like 60 hours a week, etc., etc." I Again, I think there was crunch, but uh different kinds of crunch uh crunch is kind of a spectrum and there's a lot of nuance involved there. Um and then the bro culture thing, that I think they've way made really big strides trying to eliminate. They got rid of a lot of the people who were kind of quote-unquote problematic managers, people who like participated in that kind of culture of just kind of uh really a lot of alcohol and um uh behavior that I think would not be acceptable in most professional environments, which always Rockstar has always had this kind of like this reputation around it of just like sticking it to the man, like sticking the thumb in the eye of people, like satirizing everything, shitting on everything, etc., etc. Um which is why it's funny that Rockstar is now the biggest like game company making the biggest games in the world, but um >> Mhm. >> but uh but um cuz it's like yeah, it's you are the man now. It's look at you now. Um it's interesting, but um but I think that uh you can have fun without doing this sort of antics and often abusive behavior that a lot of the people at Rockstar did, and I think that the company has has pushed out a lot of those people. Um >> Yeah. >> Yeah, I was talking to Kolbe a little bit about this and some other people there, um and they were hesitant to talk about former colleagues, which I understand. >> Um sure. >> But uh this is me paraphrasing and I don't remember the exact quote, but basically the the the the terminology they they used for like some of the people who were more problematic was like it it was their time. It was their time to to go. It was it was time for them to be out. >> So overall, it sounds like there's been progress, right? Jason's not saying people didn't crunch. I'm sure some people have, and some people probably are right now. Honestly, a lot of people probably are right now. The game's almost out. One of the other things that had a big effect on GTA 6's development and the team uh was the 2022 leaks. So, let's learn about that. Then, in September of that year, just as the game was beginning to coalesce, Rockstar staff woke up to one of the worst pieces of news they could have imagined. Someone had used a fishing attack to get access to the company's Slack channel and leaked dozens of videos featuring raw, unfinished GTA 6 gameplay. Quote, "It feels like somebody's wading through your dirty washing," Garbutt says. "It's like they're inside your head. You see your early work out there. Nobody's ever supposed to see that. It's really weirdly invasive, and so it's quite hard to deal with on an emotional level." And I can get it, you know, my coverage around those leaks back at that time, one of the main things I tried to make people realize was this game was obviously not done. It's nowhere near finished, and everyone's getting a look behind the curtain, right? A very different situation to the leaks that are happening most recently. That is a game that is pretty much done, and now instead of getting a look at probably stuff we shouldn't be seeing ever, now we're getting a look at something that's kind of finished, but is now just spoiling things for people. So, two very different unfortunate situations, I would say. Anyway, as for the 2022 leaks, this was one of the main reasons that Rockstar brought everyone back into the office. So, back to the story here, far more polarizing than overtime for many Rockstar staff was the elimination of remote work. By 2024, the company had announced that all employees would have to be in their respective offices 5 days a week, citing security issues. Perhaps most controversially, developers on GTA 6 were banned from accessing Rockstar servers and tools outside the office, forcing them to use vacation days if they needed to stay home for childcare or other emergencies. I also wanted to know how Jason got Rockstar to agree to letting him go in the first place, cuz, you know, I mean, he's not exactly someone who's gone easy on them over the years, I would say. >> Um and then in 2023, I broke the news that they were about to announce the game. They were about to announce GTA 6. >> that very well. >> That was yeah, that was um an interesting one because there had been so many other rumors before that being like, "Ah, it's about to get announced." And they never came to fruition. So, it was it was nice to be able to tell readers, "Now, look, it's actually happening." And uh I think important distinction I I've seen some people out there be like, "I can't believe you spoiled their reveal." Um I just want to be clear, we didn't spoil anything. We told people that it was going to be announced. We didn't post anything about what it what was going to be in this trailer or anything. And in fact, uh the only thing that they wound up saying the only thing they wound up doing was a tweet anyway. So, it was very funny to see people being like, "I can't believe you you took that away from me getting to see this." And I was like, "Getting to see the tweet from Rockstar Games' account saying >> Yeah, it was still another month after that, right? They announced that it was November when they put that tweet out. And I think it was what, December 5th or something like that. Yeah. >> Um but yeah, but I mean I think that that um that definitely led to some some kind of chilling of my relationship with Take-Two in general, Take-Two corporate. And so, for the next couple years, I had some coffees with their PR people. I tried to work on kind of um um going back to the more amicable relationship that I would like to have with the companies that I cover. And that's not I mean, I often am writing things that are adversarial about these companies, writing things that they don't like, reporting on things they don't like about the way they treat people, about their workers, about conditions, about all sorts of things. Um but still, I try to make clear to them that I'm always going to be accurate and fair. And fairness means that I'm always going to give them an opportunity to comment and give their side of the story. And oftentimes, when these companies are just kind of being babies and they're like, "We're not going to talk to you again." then it does a disservice to everybody because it doesn't give them a chance to give their side of the story. Anyway, but that's not to say this was happening here. But anyway, I spent a bunch of time just kind of chatting with Take-Two's PR and whatnot. And eventually got to the point where I I on better terms with them, I would say. Um and then from there, uh there were some uh I I spent a while trying to pitch Rockstar on various things. There was some turnover in their PR department, and I started talking to the new person who is in charge earlier this year, and she and I had a bunch of productive conversations. I pitched her on a bunch of ideas. And one thing they got excited about was this idea of doing a cover story for Business Week magazine. And Business magazine magazine Business Week magazine is um Bloomberg's internal print magazine. Um Rockstar, they're very into print covers. They really like their print stuff. Um they're very kind of old school in that way. And I said, "Great. Here's what this would look like. I would want to talk to these people. I would want this to be a look at I don't want to do like kind of a traditional preview, as exciting as those are. It's not something that I'm super interested in. It's not something that the Business Week audience would be interested in." And they said, "We've had enough of those as well over the past few weeks, I think. Exactly. Well, at this point, to be to be totally transparent, I didn't even know what they had planned as far as like previews and demos and and whatnot. Um so I said, "Uh that's not something that I would want to do. But what I would want to do is sit down with all the top developers and talk to them about um the development of this game. And I would want to talk to Jen Colby, who's the head of publishing at Rockstar, about the culture stuff, the culture challenges they've had, what it was like kind of trying to change, how whether or not they succeeded, etc. etc. And I would want to do this big kind of sweeping about why GTA 6 took so long, what Rockstar had to do in order to make this game, how the company has changed over the last 8 years since Red Dead 2. And after a whole months and months of just kind of back and forth and and waiting, um eventually they said, "Yes." And uh I wound up getting on a plane to Edinburgh, um just like you did, stayed at the Marriott across the street from their office, um which is very convenient. And uh and I spent pretty much a full day in their offices. It's funny, I got to Rob's office probably just like you did, and he picked up the controller and he started playing the game and I started asking him the questions and he had a hard time like answering the questions while playing it. So, I was like, you know what, we don't we don't have to spend too much time with the game. Let's just chat about the development of the game cuz we weren't talking so much about like what we were actually seeing. Instead, we were talking about like all the stuff that's happened in the past. But then yeah, and then I spoke to you a bunch of the top developers over there. Rob Nelson, Phil Hooker, and Aaron Garbutt, who are the three heads of development on GTA 6. And then a few other people. And then also just kind of on the side, I had a couple of calls, more than a couple, I had some calls with people who work just more on a ground level at Rockstar and who aren't supposed to be talking to me, but I I find them like talking to people just kind of through more back channels, just kind of more informal off-the-record conversations is a better way to get a sense of or not a better way, but it you get a sense of It's it's hard to tell what's really going on at a company when you're only talking to the top people and even they don't know exactly what's happening on the ground floor. So, as a reporter, I try to get in touch with as many people as possible, not just at the top level, but also on the ground floor. So, I had some of those conversations, too, and it all wound up leading into this big story that that ran, I don't know when this is going to air, but this story should be on the web as of October 14th and will be in print later in October. And yeah, it's really exciting. >> The full article gets into the firings and the union dispute as well. So, that's going to be linked at the top of the description if you want to check the article out for yourself. But being there did actually change the way I looked at Rockstar personally. And I asked Jason if he felt the same way. Guess it's an an overarching question in terms of your experience there, but did this Because for me, this changed the way I look at Rockstar being there and then talking to the team. It humanized them a lot. It humanized them a lot, you know. Mainly, the thing that stuck out to me as a fan, you know, not not so much on the reporting side of things, but as a fan, we look at Rockstar as this mysterious figure. They're locked down more than Area 51, right? But being there, seeing the passion mainly from people like Rob, but everyone that I spoke to, it's To me, it's quite bizarre that they don't try to show that more than they do. And that was something I pushed them for. Like, I said, come on. Do this more, please. People love People would love to see Like, we got cuz I spoke to Rob a lot. It's all transcribed, though. I said, Rob, like, the only photo we have of you is from 2018. That's the latest footage we have. >> It's so interesting. It's like there's a mystique surrounding Rockstar. And I think they like that. And I think one of the reasons for that mystique is that their top people, nobody knows their names. Like, nobody know Even your biggest fans, like, I'm guessing that a very small percentage of your audience knows who Rob Nelson or Aaron Garbut or Phil Hooker are. And those are the three people on top of this project. That to me is wild. And I think there are They have their reasons for that. Maybe it's about privacy. Maybe it's about just maintaining the mystique of Rockstar, not letting like a single person just kind of like become the face of Rockstar. But the downside is to your point, because they don't have someone who's on social media, they don't have like a face of the studio, like a Hideo Kojima or a Neil Druckmann type who's out there and doing interviews all the time. Sam doesn't When's the last time Sam did an interview? It's been years, right? Like, he doesn't speak in public. So, nobody knows who they are. And so I think that has kind of its pros and cons and one of the biggest cons, I think, is that people don't really look at them as kind of like humans. People look at Rockstar as this just kind of like this machine that produces video games and they don't even think about the human side cuz they don't have a human face to just kind of like attach to and and see is and empathize with and that's why it's so interesting to hear you say that cuz yeah, when you go in there and you talk to some of these people, it's like uh oh yeah, man, these are like really thoughtful people who um care a lot about the games that they're making, but it's very difficult to see that from the outside world because they're so secretive about it. >> Yeah. So, did it did it change your opinion of them? >> Well, I had I had talked to some of these people before and known a little bit about it. Um one thing that struck me uh that I guess I don't know if I would say this changed my opinion, but I thought it was really just kind of it it's it resonated with me. It struck me as I left was um talking to these people about their development problems and the issues they ran into on GTA 6 sounded exactly like every other game studio's problems, which is so funny cuz it's like Rockstar is the biggest company in the world. This is the most expensive game over ever made most likely. Um this game is going to sell a bazillion copies. Like the scale of it is unheard of. Like the world's going to shut down on November 19th. Uh sports leagues are going to stop. Uh they're all going to all the starters on every team are going to be benched cuz >> Yeah, I saw that Steven Adams quote. >> Yeah, it's great. Um uh so like there's so much mystique around this and so much hype around this and then you talk to them and they're just like, yeah, it took us a while to figure out what the game was, find the vision. It took us a while to find the fun. We ran into technological problems and tools problems and communication problems. And like everything they say, it just sounds like every other game I've heard about over the years, every other developer I've talked to. It's just that these guys are just they The only difference is they have like more money than any They've spent 10 times as much as anybody else. But other than that, it's like the same sorts of problems, which again just makes me think like, "Man, yeah, it would be I think interesting if if these people were out there a little bit more." It kind of reminds me of Last year I did a story about Team Cherry and the making of Silk Song, and I reached out to them and I spoke to them about that game and why it took so long, and they told me their whole story. And it was really like they are just like these two just chill, like totally super passionate, just like super talented, just totally relatable people when you talk to them. But because they had been so quiet for five years, six years, without actually saying anything about the game, they just built up this mystique in people's brains. And they're not on social media. Again, it's like I think social media has just like given people access to celebrities or like high-profile people in a way where you can kind of peek into their thoughts and hear from them all the time. And when someone is not on social media and not talking a lot publicly, they just develop this mystique around them. And I think that can be both a good and a bad thing. Again, I think there are pros and cons to it. >> Yeah. I you know, I I think for the way Rockstar has operated, it's obviously what very well. But going forward, I this is something that I've pushed them for. I'm going to continue to push them for. If you're watching this, anyone if you're watching this, I'm going to continue to pushing for continue >> They definitely watch. They all watch everything. >> Communication for the new era of Rockstar, I think it's going to be a lot more important, especially as we go into whatever the future for GTA Online is, because keeping this mystique and and the I guess lack of consistent communication for a live service. Many have tried that. Many have failed. Live service games require a lot more frequent communication. Let's let's pivot into the game. >> that, but GTA is the only one that it's worked for. So, like GTA online is is has had They have a lot of blog posts to be fair, but yeah. >> They Well, they have the weekly news wire. I I would say GTA online has succeeded in spite of the lack of the communication, not because of it. GTA online has a lot of issues with onboarding. It's a very difficult game to get into, and it's retention, which we've learned over the past year or well, 6 months to a year, its retention isn't fantastic. >> Oh, okay. Interesting. >> It's because of how popular GTA 5 is and GTA online is that new players keep coming in constantly, that the player count looks nice. But, from what I understand, players fall off pretty pretty quick and consistently. So, >> Do you think Do you think we're making ground on it with with Rockstar? Do you think this is something that will change? Do you think they'll communicate more? Do you think we'll get an interview with one of them on camera soon? >> I don't know. It's not something I've talked to them about is that particular approach. I think they see this as being effective though, because obviously this game is going I mean, when this game comes out, it's going to like blow like the sales expectations I imagine are pretty high, and I think it's still going to blow those out of the water. Like this is going to sell like 20 million copies on its first day. So, I think they'll look look that and be like, well, this is effective. What do we need to change for? Um but yeah, to your point about online, um I think when when uh when we see that, I don't know. I'm very curious to see what happens there cuz like um yeah, you're right. A lot of a lot of these online games have kind of a a face um behind them. >> A community manager. >> Community manager, yeah. >> Or the director doing their weekly stuff. Obviously, Destiny has has cycled through a few of those over the years. Um I think that has its pros and cons, too. >> I mean, I think it can burn somebody out just being the center of the internet's attention and getting all of the kind of negativity that that brings with it. And for some for a company like Rockstar, another factor to keep in mind here is that for some of these people, I think given what has happened to Rockstar with hacks and leaks over the last few years, I think they might be worried about their personal safety and security and that might be a factor, too. Like whoever is the face of Rockstar would also be subject to a lot of um criminal activity and that's pretty scary. So, also something to keep in mind, I suppose. >> All right, let's move into the delays, the dark times. We all know what this has looked like from the outside. It's been rough as fans, but I think most of us understand that, you know, if a game needs a delay, it needs a delay. But let's learn what was actually happening inside Rockstar, starting with something that I hadn't really thought about with the first trailer. Internally, it was a big moment for Rockstar staff. Not just to gape at the numbers, but also to help envision what success would look like. On a team with thousands of people, it's easy to have a parochial view. "But the trailers are huge guiding lights for us," says Jonathan Ashcroft, senior vice president for technology. "You'd think it would be done through documentation or communication, but nothing aligns us like a trailer." I love hearing stuff like that. And one of my favorite parts about trailers releasing is actually seeing all of the Rockstar developers celebrate and be proud of their work across social media. But I find it quite fascinating that not only are trailers awesome for us, but it sort of helps all of the developers understand the vision for the game. And at that point with the first trailer, the game was meant to come out in 2025. So, let's talk about that. The trailer also assured fans that the game would be out in 2025, which Rockstar's leaders say they genuinely believed at the time. Staff on the ground level were more skeptical. But, as they got closer that deadline seemed increasingly unrealistic. But, you feel a huge pressure and obligation to deliver the highest quality game in the most aggressive timescale that you can, Nelson says. And then you keep evaluating it as you go. And then you have to decide when you get within striking distance of that if it actually is achievable. The development team went to Kolbe saying they felt a delay was necessary. She called up Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick to deliver the news. First said the game would have to be delayed to May 2026. Months later she had to do it again, asking for a second delay to November, which flabbergasted Zelnick. But, I think he said, "You're kidding. Please tell me you're kidding." she recalls. But, once we talked through why, he got it. And I think we are really lucky that he is as reasonable as he is. Because a lot of people would say, "You just better figure out how to ship it." And we've been really, really lucky that we've not found ourselves in that place, because that happens to a lot of teams. And we've all played those games. It's not great. Zelnick says that it's generally a wise investment in time and financial resources if a game needs to be delayed to reach the level of perfection it has the ability to reach. That's really cool getting to hear what it was like calling off Strauss >> >> big Strauss Zelnick uh to tell him that the game has to be delayed a second time. And you know, on this channel we've tracked all of the earnings calls for years now. And we think Strauss knows everything, but I mean at times I guess clearly Strauss didn't know everything along the way. And sometimes, you know, things surprised him. Like that second delay clearly caught him off guard. Now, this next part explains some of the problems that Rockstar was running into, maybe some of the reasons for the delays, who knows. And that's it, there were so many NPCs to make that they had to build an entire studio just for that. So, at one point, for example, while assessing the number of non-playable characters they'd need to write and animate to reach their goals, they realized they didn't have the production capabilities to pull it off. Quote, "The projections they were giving us were horrifying," Nelson says. The company decided to throw money at the problem, quickly building out a studio in Los Angeles full of writers, producers, and directors who'd be solely responsible for creating NPCs. Quote, "I think when it became apparent that some areas weren't going to make it, that's when we decided to make the shift of date," Hooker says. "We could hit that schedule, but it won't be the game we want to make." So, an entire studio just for NPCs. We'd learned about this over the past few weeks, but it's kind of cool hearing some of the thought process behind it, right? To some of the team, the delays were good. Decisions were being made. The game was shaping up. Every new internal review brought with it some measure of progress and the manifestation of choices made years earlier. Late in GTA 6's development, Hooker was playing through a build of the game and was supposed to be heading to a story mission when he bumped into another car whose driver retaliated by ramming back into him and shouting. They both pulled over to sort it out, and Hooker, low on health, decided to wander into a nearby convenience store to grab some restorative items. On the way, another NPC started insulting him, which led to a violent confrontation. Nobody was at the store's cash register, so Hooker robbed it. Then, with the cops after him, he escaped, ditched his car, hunted for a new one, found another that was worth quite a bit, began driving off to sell it, was nearly crushed by a car blasting loud music, decided to follow that car, discovered a nearby compound, scoped it out, found a load of new goods to steal, headed to a fence to sell them, and received another tip for something else to do. Two hours later, Hooker was nowhere close to the story mission he was supposed to be checking out. Quote, "I remember this sheer fun of it," he says, "and everyone coming out of the review buoyed by the experience, and despite all of the concerns and doubts that plague you at that time thinking, if we stick to our guns on this, we have something really special." That two hours later, you're just getting sidetracked with all of these random things popping up. You know, we had that to some extent in GTA 5, but not to the extent of something like Red Dead 2. And honestly, maybe not even to the extent of something like GTA 4 or San Andreas. And that is something I noticed in my visit to Rockstar North as well, was just the random things happening. How many different things could pop up. And these are just decisions that Phil Hooker was describing that happened to him randomly, right? This isn't even including conscious decisions necessarily. Like maybe deciding to go to a side activity by yourself. These are just things that sort of came up that kept him getting sidetracked for almost 2 hours. So, I don't know how long my first playthrough is going to take, dude. I think it's going to be over 100 hours. I'm going to be honest. Anyway, Jason asked me what stood out about my visit in particular. And this is where our conversation went. >> Yeah, well, I want to know what you were most excited about when you saw the game and we're talking to Rob. Like what what what has you jazzed up for this for this game? >> Well, it was probably the the answer that I got to that exact question that I asked Rob in terms of what he was most proud of or most excited for. And he said something along the lines of the fact that it it all works together. Like it it works. We were all these complicated systems that don't you don't necessarily think about as as a player when you're just jumping in, but there are all of these complicated systems that are very difficult to make work together and they are working. Whether it's the the criminal profile system or the NPC systems. The new wanted I don't know if you got a good look at the new wanted level system. >> I did. Yeah, the fact that the cops know whether you're together with Lucia and Jason or like separate. Yeah, it's pretty crazy. >> Yeah, and and he was so proud of the fact that it all works. And it's something that I've had a hard time getting across in my videos. And it's something you can't even really see from the extended look. even if you watch it 50 times. You need to almost play the game yourself to fully understand how different this GTA feels to previous GTAs. >> Yeah. Yeah, the the part of it that like I was talking about earlier, the part of it that I think could be really cool is just the interactions between them because in previous GTAs, so in GTA V, I spent a lot of time just kind of messing around with the sandbox and just like mowing down pedestrians and like getting in seeing how long I could survive like getting chased by the cops and getting up to five-star wanted level or whatever. Um and I think it's cool and driving around that world is cool and all, but it gets pretty boring just because the only way to interact with the world is really just to use your gun or like a punch civilians or like rob them and there isn't really much you can do in that world other than violence. And I think the fact that you can now just spend a bunch of time with your partner and potentially get into these like really engaging conversations just while you're exploring the world. That to me is really cool because it'll make for a much more interesting just free form free roam and just like explore driving around the world and exploring the world and being able to do it while also at any time Jason and Lucia could start talking about their past and like interesting things about their inter- their relationship and how they interact and them just talking about whatever. That to me is super cool and if it's executed upon well, very exciting potential. >> This I I I don't think people realize how much of an impact that could make this game have. This this could teach an entire generation of young people how to have relationships. >> >> It's going to GTA VI is going to fix the loneliness epidemic. >> No, but I mean, to some extent it might for some people. >> No, I love it. Incredible. >> Red Dead 2 had had an impact on me in terms of, you know, trying to be a good person. The entire chapter six arc for Arthur there. Um so, I mean, look, we joke, but it it could. >> Um I'll leave you with a funny story that I uh didn't include in my Business Insider article, um but Rob Nelson was telling me that in 2015 or so, um one of the developers at Rockstar, here, I'll look up his name just so I can give him proper credit. Um came up with this prototype um for uh for like interacting with NPCs um that was like you hold their trigger button and then you can say hi to them or and it was essentially what would become the interaction system in Red Dead 2. And uh he showed that to someone. I think it might have been Phil Hooker or someone else on the team and they were like, "Do not show that to Rob." Um because everybody knew that if he showed it to Rob, Rob would be like, "We have to do this." And it would lead to so much work for everybody on the team. Um and that wound up just like changing the entire nature of Red Dead 2. Um the guy was Mark Tennett, who's now a vice president of animation. Rob was telling me that like uh once once Mark showed it and how you could just like continue walking as you talked talk to someone or you like it could walk with them and like keep up conversation with them. And this is all just like this one guy's prototype. Um he was like, "This is this is going to change everything. Like the entire way you can interact with this world." Um and yeah, I mean, it's it's cool to think that they're like taking that even further with this game and especially with the way that Jason and Lucia interact together. Cuz even then, like you sometimes NPCs would say boring stuff or ridiculous stuff or you you never really knew which way it was going to go. Now you have these two people who are going to be interacting the entire time. I mean, that to me is just yeah, it's I I really can't wait to see it. Now, this last part of Jason's story is actually what gets me the most excited. It's about the future of GTA and what Rockstar could do next after GTA 6. We're going to talk about this a bit. I love this. This gets me so hyped. Rockstar's leaders say GTA 6 is a foundation upon which they can build new content at a faster pace. And they vowed that their next release it won't take another 8 years. The engine, the tools, and the team we've built during this progress will allow us to do things more quickly, Hooker says. I feel confident that we can build on top of this and go more sideways than upwards to build more compelling content. One comparison might be the transition from GTA 3 to GTA Vice City, which was made in less than a year because it was built on work that was already done. Quote, we foundationally changed a lot of stuff on this project, Garbut says. But now it's done and we're not going to rip it apart. Oh boy, this this gets me a little bit hyped. Something I've questioned for a long time is where does Rockstar go from here? Like how can they make GTA better than GTA 6 without taking another 15 years, right? Which to me, this sounds like Rockstar is possibly planning on actually doing story DLCs for GTA 6. Like actually doing it this time. This quote about going sideways as opposed to upwards is a very big deal, right? And the comparison from GTA 3 to Vice City is big as well because Vice City actually did start out as a DLC for GTA 3. What I would love to see them do, and this isn't confirmation of anything, this is just a theory on my behalf, is make a Gloriana story DLC a year or two from now if they can, right? Make a Liberty City story DLC a few years from now. And then who knows, maybe take us to another part of America, maybe bring us back to San Andreas at some point years down the line. For me, and I don't speak for anyone, but just for me, I would prefer Rockstar to go down that route as opposed to taking another 15 years to make a GTA 7. I think the technology within GTA 6 itself is going to stand the test of time that 20 years from now, just from what I saw when I was at Rockstar, I think this game is still going to hold up. The mechanics, the graphics, everything. Anyway, here's what Jason said about that. And just to be clear, the Liberty City bit, it is an example he's making up. It's not something he's actually heard. So, let's listen. >> Um to answer your question, and what I'm sure a lot of people are wondering out there, um I don't know exactly what their plan is for just kind of future content releases. Obviously, they're putting this out, and then GTA Online, the new version, whatever that looks like, will be released at some point. I think it's expected next year, although I don't think they have a release date for it. Um plan just yet. >> even announced it. We like technically, we don't even know if it exists. >> Technically, it's unannounced still. Um they I think are looking at this, and I have quotes from this uh from from Aaron Garbut talking about this in my current Businessweek story. Um they're looking at this as like a platform, as something that is like a real foundational thing for them, um that they built, and are now going to move forward with in a lot of different directions. And what I mean by that is that they spent the last 8 years building out this massive map, and these pipelines, and getting this team together, and doing all this stuff that they hope will lead to quicker and more efficient releases in the years to come. Um what I don't know, and um maybe hasn't even been decided yet, is like I don't know what direction they're going to go in. And I think they have a lot of like ambitious ideas. They want to do a lot of stuff. So, like for example, this is not something I've heard. This is just me making something up as an example. Please don't aggregate this and turn this into a new story. But like for example, if they were to say, "Hey, we want to add Liberty City to the game in some sort of >> Don't get me started on that one. >> Yeah, which would be sick. That would be incredible. I don't know. And And again, I I'm not saying this is something that would actually happen. To me, it seems more likely. Again, this is speculation, but to me it seems more likely they would expand like north and west from or even south from Miami. But that said, if they were to add something, I don't know if their plan would be like we're going to sell this as a single-player DLC or we're going to add this as part of the ongoing game. I don't know exactly what that would look like. But those were the plans in 2020. I think there is still some semblance of a plan as far as like building on what they currently have. I just don't know exactly what that's going to look like and I also don't know how it's going to intersect with the online component and what that is going to look like cuz it could be that like they add stuff to both at the same time. I don't know. I don't know exactly what that's going to look like. But the one comparison that they made for me that the the higher-ups actually made when I was talking to them that will excite people out there is they were like, "So back in the day GTA 3 took us like a fair amount of time for like a game of that time." Obviously didn't take them eight years but like for those standards back in 2001 took us a fair amount of time. But then once we had done that, it took us only like less than a year to make Vice City after that. And so that is what they're kind of modeling after here. That's not to say they're going to have something new in less than a year. I highly doubt that. But it could be that like a couple of years from now they're making something that feels like a proper expansion or even like a new kind of game in the same that just kind of uses a lot of the pipelines and productions production kind of methodology that they built out for this one. So at least they're optimistic that they'll be able to to release more stuff at a quicker pace than they were with GTA 6 which spawned all sorts of got this before GTA 6 means >> Yeah. Well, it was it's coming to an end that's kind of sad in itself, isn't it? >> It is. >> Well, kind of like Silk Song last year, right? It was like your your fellow Aussies released Silk Song and it was like, "Oh, what are we going to joke about now?" >> Yeah, now look, I I am leaning towards uh that I guess that inkling of DLC at for GTA 6, which yeah, will if that is the the case, that'll make a lot of people happy. It's this quote here towards the end uh from Phil Hooker. Uh he said, "I feel confident that we can build on top of this and go more sideways than upwards to build more compelling content." Uh which is that that sounds like that sounds like DLC uh to me, which which honestly seems like the most logical path for GTA 6. >> of course worth noting here before people get really excited that when GTA 5 came out, there were plans for DLC on that, too, and then they got scrapped. So, you never know what's going to happen. Also, after Red Dead 2 came out, I was shocked that there was never anything more with Sadie. Like, I really expected like a Sadie expansion cuz she was such a good character, and like they seemed to be setting her up for more. So, you never know with Rockstar like what they're going to ultimately do. >> I I think this is the one. I think this is the one where we're finally going to get DLCs again for the first time since GTA 4 in a Rockstar game. So, that's it's been like 12 >> Noire L.A. Noire got DLC, too. >> Well, they okay. Sure. Well, even then, what, 15 years? >> 15 years? >> Yeah, yeah, something like that. I think that's the last Well, and then Red Dead 1 got DLC, that Undead Nightmare. Um and then L.A. Noire was after that, Max Payne 3, and then yeah, yeah, you're right, it's been like 15 years since since Rockstar was doing I mean, unless you count all the GTA Online stuff, which really took up a lot of the company's attention for a very long time. >> So, again, I'd love more single-player stories in this world, but we don't know what Rockstar's actually going to do. It could be online content, it could be something else. We're just going to have to wait and see. So, a massive thank you to Jason for coming on the channel. I'll leave both of his stories and channel linked down below. Uh let me know what you thought of this video. It's very different on this channel. I'll leave you with a couple of extra snippets here at the end from my conversation with Jason. Uh thank you for watching and I'll see you guys in the next video. Royce, do you really do you ever really think that Rockstar would invite you I mean, not just to New York, but into the belly of the beast. >> I was very surprised. I did not expect it just be some of my history of writing things that they didn't necessarily like. So, yeah, I was definitely surprised. Um >> Yeah. >> I I was pleasantly surprised. I'm glad that they decided to do this. Um And I think it's beneficial for everybody. And I think it's I think more I was also pleasantly surprised by how candid they were about stuff. And you can see that in the piece I'm talking about some of the challenges that they ran into. For example, something that I kind of I I talk about in this piece is how they had to evolve into this kind of three-headed structure where these three guys that I mentioned earlier, the three heads of development, are now the decision-makers and that led to some growing pains. And certainly there is a and a perspective from the ground level that these three were making kind of there was indecision or conflicting directions from them, especially during those first few years of development that I talk about in the piece where it was like the dark days of of GTA 6 when nobody knew what the game would actually look like. But yeah, no, I was surprised and pleasantly surprised. And it's funny with these things sometimes you you are so as a reporter I'm I'm so used to things just kind of like the ground shifting under my feet or like things changing at the last minute with these big companies that like until I even when I was on the flight to Edinburgh, even when I landed and was in my hotel, I was like, I don't believe it's happening until I am literally in the room. But yeah, no, but it was cool. It was it was really really I I appreciate them doing this and being transparent and being candid about some of the stuff that we talked about. >> Yeah, and look, as you sort of hinted at again there, that could be what this quote means from Phil, right? In terms of the sideways. Uh, that could mean massive expansions uh, to the to the online mode as opposed to single player, but Look, I I think it's hopeful that you're uh, hoping that the GTA community won't spin that into some sort of confirmation. I don't know if you've been keeping up to date with the GTA community, Jason, but they will run with with anything. >> Anything. Yeah. Yeah, the thing that annoys me the reason I wanted to come on your channel is cuz I've I've watched some of your your videos and really enjoyed them and you don't do this in a very clickbaity way. The thing that annoys me is the Twitter accounts that just take a bunch of like make up a bunch of bullet points based on like articles and videos and stuff and often don't even post a link to the original source. And half the time those bullet points are just like wrong or like full of misinformation. That's the thing that that bugs me more than anything about the the GTA community. But other than that, I mean I I've I think there's some some good good folks especially on YouTube in this scene. >> Yeah, I don't know what it is about the GTA community in particular. Maybe it's just because of how wide reaching GTA is that you get just that many people making content for it from all across the world. >> mean it does well on X and Instagram and stuff. That's why. >> Yeah, and look, even with the preview I did, I thought I explained the info I got pretty clearly and then yeah, you go on social media and Twitter and but that's not what I said, you know? Like people just completely misquoting and like, "Okay, well yeah, that's yeah, but >> It's so frustrating. >> It is. It is. Yeah. >> One real real quick, I just want to add that like um, I said this before, but I I I always want to say it cuz it like it it gives me such a joy is that um, one of the coolest things about video games, the world of video games, is that the biggest game in the world is also one of the most idiosyncratic. Like GTA 6, there will be lots of discourse surrounding this game. There will be lots of hype, lots of buzz, lots of memes, lots of controversy, lots of people complaining about it, all sorts of stuff surrounding this game. But the one thing no one can ever say about this game is that it's like a AAA trope fest. Like this is not another open world Ubisoft game where you have to climb towers to unlock map unlock maps and stuff. Like GTA 6 Rockstar's games are so unlike any other triple A games. But to me it's pretty cool that they also happen to be the biggest games in the world cuz they're so weird. Like Red Dead 2 is such a weird game. It's unlike anything else. And it's like it's a lot of it's antiquated in a lot of ways. The fact that like you go on a mission and if you head even slightly in the wrong direction for 5 seconds, you'll fail the mission immediately. And there's like bonkers checkpointing systems and like all sorts of weird stuff in these games. But they're still the biggest games in the world. And to me it's like it's proof that these AAA games don't have to follow the checklist of like we got to have our skill tree. We got to do whatever else when you could be going in weird new directions and potentially being the biggest game in the world as a result. >> Awesome. Is there anything else you want to plug, let people >> No, yeah. Well, so make sure you check out everybody out there if you find any of this of interesting and I hope you do. Go check out my Businessweek article. Don't just read the X accounts aggregating it. Read the whole story. It's a fun one. And of course people can find me on Bloomberg and on the Triple Click podcast and also on my YouTube channel One Take Shrier where I'm sure I will be talking about GTA lots in the days and weeks to come. >> Awesome. Uh well, thanks for coming on. This This has been yeah, incredible to to finally talk to you and yeah, hopefully people took something out of this and >> Yeah, I can't wait for the the game to come out. Maybe we can chat more when once the game is actually out. >> Sounds like a plan. Sounds good.