GTA 6 concept could reveal a drastic change to the map

While Grand Theft Auto 6 is reportedly in development, the long-awaited follow-up to Rockstar Games’ monumental release of GTA 5 is still nowhere in sight. But fans of the series have brought to life their vision of what GTA 6 could eventually look like on next-generation consoles.

Rockstar hasn’t confirmed any details about where its next open-world crime adventure will take place. But the most circulated GTA 6 rumor — the so-called “Project Americas” leaks — have claimed that GTA 6 will bring back some of the franchise’s most iconic cities alongside a handful of new Latin American-inspired locations. Now, a fan has brought that rumor to life.

Redditor Megahurst designed a map that geographically placed five of GTA’s most memorable cities in one enormous map. The fan-made map includes Los Santos, Liberty City, Vice City, San Fierro, and Las Venturas. Both Liberty City and Vice City have been mentioned as potential candidates for being included in GTA 6 in subsequent rumors, but a map at this scale remains more fan fiction than anything.

All of this remains unconfirmed, but gamers on Reddit were immediately enthused by the idea of such a massive map. Three commenters mentioned that having to traverse across such large areas would make planes, boats, and freeways much more meaningful than they are in GTA 5 currently.

Los Santos is estimated to be 49 square miles in total, which might seem like a lot when you’re weaving through traffic but it only takes a few minutes to travel anywhere in the city with a jet. It took one player just over eight minutes to fly the circumference of Los Santos in one of the game’s many airplanes.

While PC modes give players a bit more freedom to use planes creatively, they are a bit limited because of the size of GTA 5’s map. A more globetrotting version of GTA could address and make other in-game vehicles besides cars more tempting to use. But is a GTA 6 map like this even possible?

The Inverse Analysis — A game of this scale does seem a bit overambitious. GTA 5’s PlayStation 4 file size already clocked in at 76 GB so jamming five equally sized cities in one map could bring the game’s file size to 300 or 400 GB, which would be completely unreasonable. But it’s undeniable how a multi-city map could take the GTA experience to the next level.

Rockstar could opt for a more focused version of Megahurst’s map, with two or three cities instead of five. The PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series X will both come with solid-state drives and vastly improved graphical capabilities that will make larger-scale digital cities a reality.

So while it might not be anything more than fan fiction right now, a GTA game with multiple cities might soon become a reality.

GTA 6 is currently in development.