GTA 6 leak suggests Rockstar may take an unexpected cue from Fortnite

Grand Theft Auto 6 rumors just keep on coming, and the latest scuttlebutt suggests the long-awaited launch of Rockstar’s upcoming game might be taking some interesting inspiration from Fortnite. In a 4chan post published at the end of May, one alleged Rockstar source teased how the next major installment in the franchise may be revealed. The source post has since been deleted but was permanently cataloged on Reddit by user Mendax42.

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Amongst a litany of claims made about the upcoming PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X versions of Grand Theft Auto 5 set to release this November, the supposed list of features claims “GTA Online [is] receiving four large updates heading into the GTA 6 marketing campaign, which will take place over live events.”

And, as anyone with a basic knowledge of modern multiplayer gaming likely knows, the term “live event” has largely become synonymous with Fortnite: Battle Royale. Ever since the Island’s 2018 rocket launch made cracks in the sky over the original Fortnite map, many popular live service games from Call of Duty: Warzone to Destiny 2 have emulated that formula. Most recently, the Warzone faithful saw zombies and a nuke swallow up the first version of Verdansk.

Given the present trend toward live events in online games, it’d certainly make sense for GTA Online to attempt its own spin on the idea. After all, the virtual playground reached its highest-ever peak player count in 2020 with the launch of the Cayo Perico heist expansion, which means there’s likely still plenty of interest in new content to serve those active gamers. Given how momentous the inevitable launch of GTA 6 will be, hyping up its arrival with multiple large DLC drops also sounds like a celebration befitting of the series’ stature. Rockstar hasn’t done much with live events in the past, but, with some of the industry’s most skilled developers under its stable, there’s little doubt they’re capable of pulling off such a challenging feat.

But, as reasonable as the idea of GTA Online hosting multiple Fortnite-style live events might be, is this rumor real? From our perspective, it’s difficult to say. It doesn’t help that the source of the rumor comes from 4chan, a site that tends to host far more fake leaks than real ones. However, there have been a few rare edge cases over the years that have proven to be accurate.

Perhaps the most salient point one might use to potentially debunk this rumor is in the claim that the PS5 and Xbox Series X versions of GTA 5 feature a “campaign and systems that have been redesigned to support VR.” While also equally feasible in a general sense, greenlighting a project of that nature seems to directly contradict words expressed by Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick during a May 2021 earnings call.

“The buzzwords of VR didn’t get this industry too far and AR hasn’t improved matters either,” Zelnick told his company’s investors. “3D hasn’t done much for us. What moves the dial in our business is amazing creativity, great characters, great stories, great graphics, great gameplay. The ability to enjoy those experiences with other people all around the world. That is what really matters.”

In other words, VR currently doesn’t seem to play a prominent role in the GTA publisher’s future.

If that very pointed claim of VR support for GTA 5 winds up being incorrect, as this quote implies, it’s significantly more likely that other parts of the leak might be wrong as well. With that fact in mind in addition to its dubious source, it’s worth taking this new GTA 6 info with a sizable grain of salt.

For those most eager to learn more about the next iteration of GTA 5, however, the leak also mentions the upcoming next-gen builds have improved vehicle damage, physics, ragdoll animations, AI enhancements, and more than 100 additional licensed radio tracks. Tweaks on this scale sound like a shoo-in for any high-profile re-release, though, so many of these bullet points might wind up being correct by sheer luck as opposed to being an indication of genuine connection to the project. A live event for GTA Online sounds great, but we’d temper our expectations with regard to it happening exactly as this rumor describes.