Industry insider and Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier claims that when he last heard about the development of Grand Theft Auto 6, the game was "not content complete", but he is still hopeful for the November 2026 release date, which he describes as "more real" than the previous 2025 or May 2026 dates.
Speaking on the Button Mash Podcast, Schreier discusses Rockstar's usual development cycle, and how GTA 6 is currently following the same pattern as Red Dead Redemption 2. "This is how Rockstar works, or at least has worked in recent decades I suppose," he says.
"In the recent, the last decade, with Red Dead 2, if you look at the history there, they announced it for fall 2017, then it slipped to spring 2018, and then it slipped again to fall 2018, and then it landed October of that year. So I wouldn't be super shocked if that is what happens again this time around."
Schreier doesn't discuss when he last heard news about GTA 6's development from inside Rockstar, but claims that the game was "not content complete" at that time. "This is a big and complicated game," he says. "The last I heard it was still not content complete. That is to say that people were still finishing things up, still finalizing levels and missions and seeing what's going to make it into the game."
He doesn't state that it will definitely be released in November, but says it's more likely to do so than previously announced release dates. "It's really hard to say [what the release date will be] right now," Schreier says. "I don't think anyone at Rockstar could tell you with 100% certainty that they will make it out in November. But I think it feels a little more real than fall 2025 did."
For GTA 6's publisher, Take-Two Interactive, Schreier claims its stock price will be a major concern with GTA 6 very likely to be released before the end of the financial year in March 2027. However, the game's quality will reportedly remain the publisher's top priority.
"With a game like this the stakes are so high right?" he says. "They really can't settle for anything less than perfection with this release because there's so much riding on it. The entire like, the stock of Take-Two lives or dies on this game. Every time this game slips, their shares drop 10%.
"It's not something that they will release in any sort of compromised state. So if it comes to, even if it comes to October, and they're like, you know, the game is not 100% ready, I suspect they would rather slip than release it."
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