Reporting On The Newest GTA 6 'Leak' Is Way Overhyped
It seems like every other day, a new "Grand Theft Auto 6" leak or rumor emerges to stir up the passionate fanbase. At this point, fans are all but certain that the game will release in 2024, thanks to comments made by Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick and others close to the project. They're also pretty certain that the game returns the franchise to the classic setting of Vice City. And judging from what little fans have seen of the project thus far, thanks to a massive leak that dumped footage from the game onto the internet last year, the game is probably going to be worth the decade-plus wait. However, not all leaks should inspire an equal level of excitement from fans.
Within the last few days, clips from "GTA 6" have been circulating online, most notably posted by fan account @RockstarGTAVI, which has since been suspended. In the footage, the new game's protagonists are on the run from the cops, who seem to be supported by much more intelligent AI than ever before. Another clip depicts the player characters interacting with partygoers in a nightclub, while another shows off how much smoother the new game's swimming mechanics appear to work when compared to "Grand Theft Auto 5." Some fans started to share this footage excitedly (before it was quickly pulled), while a number of news outlets began reporting on the impressive clips and touting the leaks as incredible, mind-blowing discoveries. A few YouTubers had a field day with the leak, posting videos analyzing the footage and talking about the implications for Rockstar's next great crime sim.
There's just one problem: It seems much of the footage in question, if not all of it, was not actually new.
We've seen this GTA 6 footage before
As noted by fans on X/Twitter and Reddit, as well as a few news outlets including TechBriefly, the footage being discussed as a new leak have previously popped up online. These clips and more — hours of footage, in fact — were part of the original mega-leak shared by hackers in September 2022. Of course, not everyone had a chance to save all of those videos before they were scrubbed from the internet and Rockstar's lawyers swooped in. It makes sense that people would get excited to see something from "GTA 6" that's new to them, but the actual newness of this footage has unfortunately been blown way out of proportion. For instance, the police chase described in several reports sounds almost exactly like one that made the rounds on Reddit nearly a year ago.
This has led to the news backfiring in some ways, as some fans have expressed feeling fed up with what they see as constant "GTA 6" clickbait. One Twitter user remarked, "I like how most of the GTA 6 videos are called something like 'NEW LEAKS!' and it's just something already in the hack, stuff that was in GTA 5, or common f***ing sense." Others have taken to uploading clips from the original leak to prove that the "recent" footage isn't recent at all. (Don't do that, by the way. Rockstar is definitely watching.) Of course, not everyone posting about the leaks is trying to mislead fans; it's just that some folks might have missed this footage when it last appeared.
There's no denying that there's a very real hunger for new "GTA 6" updates. However, the unfortunate truth is that this week's "leaks" have apparently been greatly over-exaggerated.