Dan Houser says Rockstar Games only attempted GTA London once in 26 years because the series is “so much about America” that “it wouldn’t really have worked in the same way elsewhere”

Two bikers posing with a revolver and a motorbike in Grand Theft Auto 6 area Ambrosia — (Image credit: Rockstar Games)

Rockstar Games has only branched out and taken its hit criminal series across the pond once with an oft-forgotten PS1 GTA London mission pack, and that’s because the series is so rooted in Americana, American satire, and, well, guns, according to studio co-founder and former lead writer Dan Houser.

"We made a little thing in London 26 years ago, GTA London, for the top-down one for the PS1," Houser recalled in a chat with Lex Fridman. "That was pretty cute and fun."

But, when asked about why the series never went back to London or another city outside of the USA, Houser said the studio "always decided there was so much Americana inherent in the IP, it would be really hard to make it work in London or anywhere else." Naturally, "you needed guns, you needed these larger-than-life characters" - and you could find that pretty easily in the series’ exaggerated versions of New York or Miami.

"The game was so much about America, possibly from an outsider’s perspective," he added. "That was so much about what [the series] was that it wouldn’t really have worked in the same way elsewhere."

GTA has pretty frequently bitten into American politics, corruption, consumerism, the country’s media, and much more with its satirical fangs for generations at this point. And if GTA 6’s jabs at social media are any indication, the series has no plans to slow down.