“Early Monday morning, there was a malfunction in one of the heating boilers at Rockstar North,” said the spokesperson. “Many thanks to those that reached out with concern, and also to the police and fire crews who were on scene quickly to assess the situation – please know that everyone is well and our studio remains open and operational.”

The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service had been alerted to the incident at 5:02 AM GMT, resulting in three fire appliances and specialist resources being mobilized. The firefighters then worked to “secure structural damage at a commercial building,” and no casualties were reported.

The studio has been hard at work on Grand Theft Auto 6, which is slated for release on November 19 on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. The currently-planned release date is only the latest after the project suffered multiple delays, from its original 2025 launch window to March 2026, to now in November.

Former animator for the studio Mike York, however, doesn’t think that we’ll see any more delays befalling Grand Theft Auto 6. In an interview last month, he said that yet another delay would do quite a bit of harm to the marketing hype behind the highly-anticipated game.

“I think the game will be released in November 2026 as it’s a good time for the game to come out for Rockstar for multiple reasons to sell video games. If you want to sell a big amount of video games then that’s the perfect time for GTA 6 to come out with it being a month before Christmas,” said York. “Usually companies only delay these things once or twice when they need to, so I think it will come out around that time.”

Alongside gamers, several game developers have also been eagerly awaiting Rockstar Games’ upcoming release. Among these, according to Famitsu, have been a number of Japanese developers who spoke about the title’s potential to “redefine players’ standards” and how “it’ll be a once-in-a-generation turning point for games”.

Amidst all this, Rockstar Games has also been the subject of criticism thanks to its controversial firing of over 30 employees back in November. While the studio alleged that the employees were partaking in “gross misconduct” by leaking confidential details to outsiders, the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB) has called the company out for union busting.

Earlier this month, the employees, working with the IWGB to pursue legal action against Rockstar Games, were denied a request for interim pay by an employment tribunal with Judge Frances Eccles residing. The judge’s denial of interim pay came on the grounds of the employees being unable to demonstrate a “pretty good chance of success” at its legal pursuits about the studio’s union busting.

“Operations Control mobilized three fire appliances and specialist resources to the scene, where firefighters worked to secure structural damage at a commercial building.” Emergency crews reported no casualties and finally left at 9:21 AM.

Rockstar Games hasn’t issued a statement, and while the exact cause is not clear, reports from Edinburgh Live claim that the boiler room was the source of the explosion. We’ll have to wait for more details, but given the time that it occurred, it seems the offices were empty at the time.

Grand Theft Auto 6 launches on November 19th for Xbox Series X/S and PS5. Thus far, it’s suffered two major delays, the first from Fall 2025 to May 2026. There’s also the case of 34 employees fired from Rockstar, the majority of whom worked at Rockstar North, for allegedly leaking confidential information.

While the Independent Workers of Great Britain (IWGB) brought the case before an employment tribunal to obtain interim pay for the employees, the latter denied this request. Regardless, the union is keen on going ahead with the lawsuit.

On a completely different note, it seems that Rockstar and Take-Two Interactive helped a terminally ill fan play Grand Theft Auto 6 early. You can learn more about that here.

With GTA 6 delayed again, this time to November 14, 2026, and with another delay possible, we’re here to argue that it shouldn’t be that way, and that this is a genre that carries a lot of potential for riveting experiences across a spectrum of crime sandboxes that are worth making as well as playing. Why do we believe so?

That’s what we’re about to explain.

A Legend’s Looming Shadow

Yes, games like GTA 5 don’t come along too often. But that’s exactly what we’re trying to say. They don’t have to. But perhaps a bunch of smaller experiences that try and tackle a more nuanced approach to specific aspects of the open city crime world, or maybe take a flyer on facets that Rockstar’s flagship hasn’t gotten around to, might help with long dormancy in the genre?

They would certainly help fill the vacuum between successive instalments from major franchises, keeping the genre alive for fans of cities that live and breathe, responding to your actions in a way that feels very engaging and immersive. Working outside of the law in such a world can be both amazing and a curse depending on the situation, and the sheer grandeur of GTA’s cities, alongside their size and scope, can be hard to emulate.

But a smaller title that perhaps takes a different approach to criminal activity can meld the best of the genre with innovative twists to create a fresh take. It’s certainly better than leaving fans of the genre to fill the long gaps between titles with smaller projects of their own.

But let’s give credit where it’s due, and take a look at a few noteworthy games that did grace the genre in the years before and after GTA 5 we think about what could be next around this time next year, with its successor hopefully in its players’ hands by then.

A Few Fond Memories

Sleeping Dogs is a good place to start. Playing as an undercover cop and having to actually maintain the illusion of loyalty made for a story that carried a lot of great moments and a lot of tension. Having Shen earn three different kinds of XP, each of which improved a specific aspect of his abilities, was a masterful touch that gave this one a degree of immersion that other titles don’t really nail down as well.

While it could have balanced its melee combat and gunplay a little better, this is definitely among the finest games to grace the open city crime genre, and one whose interesting twist bakes itself into every important aspect of the experience.

Saints Row is another great example of a title that gets the genre’s trappings right. It’s unspoken emphasis on chaotic mayhem, along with the penchant for some charming commentary, this one brought quite a lot of personality to the table. But the 2022 reboot didn’t really work towards the game’s own strengths, with a lackluster story and buggy release dampening the enthusiasm for a title that once stood tall among its peers in the genre.

There’s also Watch Dogs 2, which did a great job of building on its predecessor, bringing an element of strategy and stealth to the genre with its hacking and gadget-focused approach to missions and side content. It was an interesting twist on the crime formula, combined with an open world that had a lot to do and discover.

It’s an experience that’s quite unique and does a great job of keeping you invested in its world, and deserves merit for what it has achieved. It made creating havoc in its world feel clever, instead of merely a loud distraction. There was a method to its madness, and a calmness to its chaos that made it an experience that puts its own spin on what crime in the modern age looks like.

And of course, the Mafia franchise has more than delivered on the crime front, although its linear sandboxes don’t quite touch the highs that a truly open world can reach. But it’s a strong argument in favor of experiences that hit hard, and remain memorable as a result. It also makes a case for more serious, nuanced takes on crime. Not every crime game needs a sprawling megacity and a casual undertone, after all.

There’s clearly a demand for crime-based games, but what has limited their supply? That’s another interesting facet of this genre’s dormancy.

Even The Best Laid Plans Can Go Wrong

For starters, building a giant city that actually does the job of pulling you into its world is no walk in the park. You’re going to want crowds that actually live in the city with distinct patterns to their virtual lives. You want traffic that feels as unpredictable as it does in the real world. You want law enforcement to dynamically respond to your actions and give you the thrill of the chase. And you want all of these systems colliding without breaking.

When they do, your experience is marred by bugs and glitches. But when they don’t, you get a world that’s just too good to ignore. That’s a solid argument in favor of smaller worlds that get nearly everything right, compared to large worlds in which too many things could go wrong.

Secondly, balancing controlled missions with chaotic mischief is difficult for any genre, while picking between a realistic, gritty presentation versus a light-hearted take can be too binary of a choice. The right combinations of these elements present a fantasy in which you feel free to do as you please, while the game’s invisible strings pull you along the inevitable path forward.

But if a game falls off this tricky tightrope, the fantasy collapses with it. That’s something even the most seasoned studios are cautious of, and another reason for creating experiences that reflect the scope of their respective teams, with efficient use of available resources being more important than grandeur and scale.

And there’s also the matter of crafting interiors on buildings and other environments that feed into the fantasy of a living, breathing world that’s truly in service to your whims. They’re expensive, but also too necessary to the core experience to be stingy about, and the best of the best developers know this. It’s perhaps why open city crime games have been left to the industry’s giants.

But again, smaller projects could alleviate budget concerns, striking a balance between immersion and scale that could allow some truly intense and captivating stories to be told through the crime genre’s lens.

And let’s not forget driving. Cars in these games must feel authentic and also fun to drive around, another tricky balance to pull off, even for the best. With all these constraints, it makes sense for studios to be cautious about tackling open-world crime. But what are the alternatives?

New Takes, New Possibilities

One way to do it would be to take a heist-focused approach to gameplay. That could mean planning entry and exit routes, acquiring relevant disguises to enable infiltrations, establishing relationships with fences for stolen goods, and arranging clean getaways in the event that things go south. The fantasy would be in the preparation and execution of your plans, while improvising in the field is always an option to get the adrenaline flowing.

Another option is to take a smaller district of a large city and have three to four densely populated areas that make it feel much larger than it actually is. I’ve always argued that a smaller map with more stuff in it is a lot better than a massive one that’s comparatively empty. Sleeping Dogs took a middle route to this approach, but a smaller studio could certainly scale things down.

Social stealth and a faction-based gameplay loop like the one in Watch Dogs is also an interesting avenue to pursue. It could make for some intense missions and perhaps even set pieces in which your character’s faction sets up ambushes or traps across the world and vice versa. That’s a great way to populate a sandbox with activities and events that unfold as you go along, dynamically and in a way that makes the entire experience addictive.

Going down the pulp playground route is also an option, and a studio with the wit and charm to double down on absurdity could do very well to bring a fresh new franchise to bring the open city crime genre into a very welcome spotlight.

The Future of Crime

We look forward to games based in cities that sit up and take notice when we walk by. We want our actions to have witnesses, and for the potential for more chaos as a result. We want to see patrols that change, cops that escalate conflicts believably and with precision, capers that we can plan from end to end before going all guns blazing if and when something goes wrong, and an experience where failure creates fun stories.

The open city crime genre needs to get past the kneecapping notion that its experiences need to match the size and scale of GTA or not exist at all. Imagine these long years marked by a thrilling heist sim, a district-scale crime RPG, and a pulpy stunt sandbox. That’s three potentially excellent games that could have had the space to breathe in the years between GTA titles.

We hope to see more of this genre in a post-GTA 6 world, and perhaps find new studios willing to bring their own unique perspectives to its trappings. Time will tell if our wish comes true. Until then, it’s time to count down the days until we get to dive into Rockstar’s latest take on one of its greatest hits.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

However, after shooting “some stuff,” it “just disappeared”, and Rockstar never followed up with them on the same. That is, until now. Sort of. Former lead writer and Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser finally opened up on the DLC while speaking to Lex Fridman.

“The internet knows we made a DLC… single-player DLC for GTA 5 that never came out. It was one when you played as Trevor, but he was a secret agent. It was cute.”

However, much like the studio’s forays with cancelled PS3 spy fantasy Agent, “It never quite came together, and it was never finished. It was about half done when it got abandoned. But I think if that had come out, we probably wouldn’t have been able to make Red Dead Redemption 2. So, there are always compromises.”

While it never revisited the idea of releasing single-player DLC for the open-world hit, Houser still enjoys the model. “I like making the stories. For me, I love the model of Grand Theft Auto 4, where you had the extra stories coming afterwards, or Red Dead 1, when you had the zombie pack afterwards. I like just doing these extra things.

“So, I would personally like to have done more of that in that company. And with stuff we’re doing in the future, we’re going to try to come up with worlds where we can add more stories. I like single-player DLC. I just think the audience loves it, and it’s really fun to make.”

With Grand Theft Auto 6 next on Rockstar’s release schedule, launching on May 26th, 2026, for Xbox Series X/S and PS5, one has to wonder if it will have DLC. Rumors have claimed that the company wants to expand on the title with “regular” post-launch updates, but it’s unclear whether those are free or paid.

There’s also the matter of Grand Theft Auto Online and how it will work in the sequel. As always, stay tuned for more updates.

He added, “You needed guns, you needed these larger-than-life characters.”

Houser framed Grand Theft Auto’s identity as a commentary on American life – politics, media, consumerism, crime, mythmaking, and suggested that transplanting that tone wholesale to other countries would change the series at a fundamental level. “It just felt like the game was so much about America, possibly from an outsider’s perspective…It wouldn’t really have worked in the same way elsewhere.”

The comments also help explain why GTA’s rare detour to the UK remained a one-off. While Rockstar’s cities have long been fictionalized riffs on New York and Los Angeles, the studio has kept its creative focus on the uniquely American mix that fuels the series’ commentary and outlandish characters.

Bottom line: Houser’s observation underscores how deeply Grand Theft Auto is woven into the fabric of American identity. The series doesn’t just use America as a backdrop; it thrives on its depiction. Relocating the game outside the U.S. would mean dismantling that framework and rebuilding it for a culture with different social tensions, institutions, and myths.

Speaking to Lex Fridman, former Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser said it’s the fact that each new title always feels different. While the gap between releases is a factor, the development team avoids rushing out a new entry.

“I think we did a really good job of constantly innovating within what the IP was. The games always felt different, you know, people have very strong feelings. ‘I like this one. I didn’t like that one as much.’ Because they are pretty different.”

Not that Rockstar is trying to hide the core appeal of the franchise, i.e. embodying a criminal or three and going absolutely wild in a massive sandbox. But how it goes about that feels different each time.

“It’s a Grand Theft Auto, you know, it’s going to be a game about being a criminal, but the way it’s going to be a game is going to change quite a lot. So, I think the way the IP kept evolving made people really excited to play it.”

Marketing also plays a big part. “We really tried to market them in a way that felt like an update of classic film marketing, where you really felt like you’re already in the product just because you’d seen the trailers and stuff,” says Houser.

Grand Theft Auto 6 launches on May 26th, 2026, for Xbox Series X/S and PS5. It will be the first game in the series’ history that doesn’t feature any writing or characters by Houser.

“We have to protect our intellectual property, but more than that, we have to be mindful of others. If you create intellectual property with AI, it’s not protectable.”

What if the technology had all constraints removed on its usage? “Could we push a button tomorrow and create an equivalent to the ‘Grand Theft Auto’ marketing plan?” said Zelnick. “The answer is no. A, you can’t do that yet, and B, I am of the view that you wouldn’t end up with anything very good. You end up with something pretty derivative.”

This is primarily due to the “backward-looking” nature of AI and its processing of older information, which could be ideal for, say, disease research. However, such an approach is at odds with creating a rich narrative universe that titles like Grand Theft Auto or Red Dead Redemption are known for.

“Anything that involves backward-looking data compute, it’s really good for that, and that applies to lots of things. What we do at Take-Two, anything that isn’t attached to that, it’s going to be really, really bad at,” said Zelnick.

Of course, that hasn’t stopped other companies from investing in AI, especially Electronic Arts, which has allegedly pushed developers for about a year now to integrate the technology. Microsoft has also received pushback for its investment in OpenAI, though it insists there’s no mandate to use it in game development. As Halo: Campaign Evolved director Greg Hermann recently noted, “It really is about that creative spark that comes from people and improving just overall workflows.”

As for the current Grand Theft Auto, namely Grand Theft Auto 6, it’s launching on May 26th, 2026, for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. Previously slated for this year, it faced a delay for more polish. Check out the latest trailer here.

This is up over five million units from the previous quarter, bringing the series’ total to almost 450 million sales. Red Dead Redemption 2 has sold over 74 million sales thus far (up four million from the last quarter) and over 100 million sales for the franchise.

Grand Theft Auto 5 launched in 2013 and has been available for three console generations, with the Expanded and Enhanced arriving for Xbox Series X/S and PS5 in 2022 (and more recently for PC). Red Dead Redemption 2 is equally impressive, maintaining steady sales growth despite the lack of a current-gen upgrade.

Grand Theft Auto 6 is out on May 26th, 2026, for Xbox Series X/S and PS5. Check out the latest details here.

Fortunately, it seems a new report is coming in the next few weeks courtesy of Insider Gaming’s Tom Henderson. On the latest Insider Gaming Weekly podcast, he revealed, “Speaking of stories and GTA 6, I do have, like, a well-researched story coming out in the next couple of weeks about GTA 6 and the online component.”

It’s unknown whether the report will mention a release window or single-player details. Regardless, Grand Theft Auto Online – a money-maker for Take-Two since it launched in October 2013 – and how it will function in Grand Theft Auto 6 has been left ambiguous since the latter’s announcement.

Will Rockstar announce GTA Online 2 or is it the same mode? Can players transfer purchases and data? What about the mode’s future on previous-gen consoles? Time will tell, so stay tuned for updates.

However, it’s seemingly part of parent company Take-Two Interactive’s marketing strategy for the title. CEO Strauss Zelnick spoke to Bloomberg, and when asked about why the release date is such a carefully held secret, he responded, “The anticipation for that title may be the greatest anticipation I’ve ever seen for an entertainment property, and I’ve been around the block a few times, and I’ve been in every entertainment business there is.

“And…we want to maintain the anticipation and the excitement. And we do have competitors who will describe their release schedule years in advance. We found that the better thing to do is to provide marketing materials relatively close to the release window in order to create that excitement on the one hand and balance the excitement with unmet anticipation. We don’t always get it exactly right, but that’s what we’re trying to do.”

It’s not exactly out of the blue for big publishers today – see PlayStation heavily promoting its biggest first-party exclusives two or three months in advance. However, “relatively” is the keyword for Grand Theft Auto 6 since it’s unclear when Take-Two will begin its marketing campaign.

Stay tuned for more details and updates. Grand Theft Auto 6 is in development for Xbox Series X/S and PS5, with Zelnick believing it will lead to a “meaningful uptick” in console sales. Reports also indicate that major developers and publishers could delay their titles depending on the launch date. Head here for more details.