Former Rockstar director calls ‘GTA 6’ leaks a ‘nothing burger’

The internet has been breathlessly talking about the Grand Theft Auto VI leaks ahead of the extended look coming to Netflix this week, but one former Rockstar Games lead is telling everybody to “calm down.”

An individual or group known as CyberLeek has leaked alleged clips of GTA 6 gameplay last week, including maps and videos. Take-Two Interactive Software Inc. (the parent company of video game publisher Rockstar Games) subsequently subpoenaed Microsoft, Discord, and GitHub over “stolen content,” confirming that at least some of the information from CyberLeek is legitimate.

But Obbe Vermeij, former technical director at Rockstar North (an Edinburgh-based Rockstar Games studio), posted on X that the leaks are a “nothing burger.”

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“Calm down everybody,” he wrote. “The leaks are a nothing burger.”

Vermeij goes on to claim that Rockstar’s marketing strategy is to keep the game under wraps longer than other publishers do, and that all that happened was that some footage escaped.

“90 [percent] of future players don’t spend their time on the internet looking for video snippets. They don’t have the time and don’t want spoilers,” he continued. “I imagine the teams are a little annoyed about it but not more than that.”

“I was there during Hot Coffee,” Vermeij wrote, referring to a controversy surrounding a hidden minigame in the 2004 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas that included a sex scene. Rockstar and Take-Two settled a lawsuit over it. Vermeij said it was a “nightmare” for Rockstar’s New York office, it didn’t affect Rockstar North as much, and that the current leaks are far less consequential.

“It looks like gta6 will be phenomenal and sell for the next 15 years or so. The leaks are just a tiny blip,” he concluded.