Rockstar Games Reveals When GTA VI Development Began

Rockstar North head Rob Nelson shared that development on GTA VI began back in 2015, with the main part of the team joining the project following the release of Red Dead Redemption 2 in 2018.

In an interview with Trois Couleurs, Nelson explained why Rockstar takes so long to work on a game. According to him, the team tries to choose ideas that will not feel outdated by the time the title launches.

We make games over a very long period of time. The project has been in development since 2015, so the idea has been brewing for a very long time.

At the same time, most of the developers started working on GTA VI in earnest only after the release of Red Dead Redemption 2.

Nelson noted that current events and internet memes can change significantly over years of development, which is why Rockstar carefully chooses themes for satire.

The bulk of the team really started working on it after the release of Red Dead Redemption 2 in 2018. We have to be very careful in choosing the ideas we want to put in there, because it can take a long time to figure out how exactly to present them.

Rockstar also created new tools to flesh out the diversity of characters and modern Vice City appearances. According to Nelson, a playthrough of GTA VI may take at least 80 hours. The game will be released on November 19, 2026, for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S.

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