The Truth About GTA 5's Lost DLC

"Grand Theft Auto 5" celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2023, and it was a bittersweet moment for longtime fans. Although the game's online component is still going strong with new content and improvements, yet another year has gone by without any major updates to the base game. With "GTA 6" on the horizon, it's all but certain that fans will never see a story DLC for the preceding game. This seems almost impossible to consider, especially in light of how much money "GTA 5" has made for Rockstar Games, but there are actually a number of reasons for this decision.

In a chat with Forbes from 2017, former Rockstar design director Imran Sarwar explained that the dev essentially ended any plans for "GTA 5" story DLC early on, preferring instead to focus on other pursuits. At the time, "Red Redemption 2," "Grand Theft Auto Online," and the PS4 version of "GTA 5" were seen as higher priorities, and those projects certainly paid off in the long run. Still, it's hard not to wonder what could have been. Thanks to some info that's leaked over the last decade through various avenues, we have a pretty good idea of what DLC was left on the cutting room floor, as well as some of the depressing reasons why they were cut. Not all of the expansions planned for "Grand Theft Auto 5" were left out because of the popularity of "GTA Online."

Despite its non-canon status, "Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare" is a highly regarded expansion of the "Red Dead" mythos, telling the story of outlaw John Marston and his battle against a world-ending zombie horde. The DLC has inspired numerous fan theories over the years, as well as calls for a follow-up from Rockstar Games. Fans almost got their wish when "Grand Theft Auto 5" was released, as Rockstar apparently had plans to put Los Santos through a zombie apocalypse of its own.

In an interview with Eurogamer, noted "GTA" data miner Tez2 revealed some of the scant details he and fellow leaker Yan2295 have uncovered over the years. It seems "GTA 5" came very close to receiving a truly expansive update. "[Rockstar] had plans to redesign 80 or 90 per cent of the map to fit a specific theme, one of the episodes was supposed to feature a zombie apocalypse," explained Tez2. "Rockstar would make changes to the whole map to fit the zombie apocalypse theme." It's unknown whether this DLC would have been a standalone non-canon story like "Undead Nightmare" or if Rockstar might have found a way to fit this narrative into the bonkers world of "GTA 5."

"The Doomsday Heist" was released in 2017 as a major expansion to "GTA Online" and immediately became a hit with players. In this quest-line, hacker extraordinaire Lester Crest (from the "GTA 5" story campaign) tasks players with a series of heists that may ultimately save the world from annihilation. Things get pretty wild, including a whole section requiring players to utilize both stealth and a jetpack. According to multiple data miners, however, major elements of "The Doomsday Heist" were recycled from an unproduced "GTA 5" story DLC.

Plans for a major heist involving a casino were first leaked in 2015, but the DLC went through some major changes before it finally saw the light of day. Tez2 told Eurogamer, "most or some of the online updates that we received in 2017 and 2018 were based on the planned single-player DLC." Data miners have posited for years that Lester and "GTA 5" fan-favorite Trevor would have likely factored heavily into this scrapped chapter, with the latter perhaps even taking to the skies in his very own jetpack. More recent data leaks have seemingly confirmed this theory.

Cut #GTAV Story Mode DLC is further confirmed thanks to the PDB leak with a string relating to Trevor and a jet pack. The Doomsday Heist was definitely a rework of it.

Info @GlowDevs pic.twitter.com/TRqnJLOMFS

— Liam (@billsyliamgta) November 19, 2023

"The Doomsday Heist" ended up not involving a casino as part of the fun. However, it's believed that the Diamond Casino and its related heists — first added to "GTA Online" in 2019 — were also fleshed out from their original place as part of "GTA 5" story DLC.

"Cops N' Crooks" is a multiplayer mode introduced in "GTA 4" that splits gamers into two separate teams: police officers and criminals. In various scenarios, the cops are charged with hunting down the bad guys before they complete their goals. The mode was such a hit with players that Rockstar seriously considered adding it to "Grand Theft Auto 5." When the decision was made to focus more on building out "GTA Online," "Cops N' Crooks" was put on the back burner, with the idea being to eventually implement the beloved "GTA 4" mode for the "Online" audience. According to data leaks from late 2023, "Cops N' Crooks" was set to receive a pretty hefty overhaul, seemingly adding a ton of new character classes and gameplay mechanics, with hackers and even soldiers apparently joining the fray. It's still unknown how these specialities would have functioned differently within the game (although the updated "Cops N' Crooks" would have apparently offered several abilities and loadouts for each), but it's fascinating for fans to see how much Rockstar might have improved an already-solid mode.

GTAV PDB LEAKS – COPS N' CROOKS – THREAD

Originally, it was planned for there to be 8 different roles, it seems. Those are Cop, Crook, Officer, Tactical, Tech, Soldier, Enforcer and finally hacker. But there is no word on what specifics each of these roles do. pic.twitter.com/dx9POgwmI7

— Glow (@GlowDevs) November 19, 2023

According to sources close to the game's production (via Bloomberg), "Cops N' Crooks" was scrapped once and for all in 2020, but for very different reasons. Following the death of George Floyd and the subsequent protests against police brutality, Rockstar execs feared that it would be entirely the wrong time to release a DLC that could be seen as making light of a real-world issue. It remains to be seen if "GTA 6" will make use of any of the preceding game's dropped concepts or mechanics.