$2 billion, 12 years, arrests: How world’s costliest online game value greater than Avatar, Avengers, Star Wars mixed

The world’s costliest online game

GTA VI (in full Grand Theft Auto VI) is the costliest online game made in historical past. The eighth Grand Theft Auto essential collection sport (and the sixteenth total), GTA VI, is scheduled for launch on Could 26 subsequent 12 months (2026). Nevertheless it has been in growth since 2014. The Impartial reported that the movie has value its makers, Rockstar Video games, $1-2 billion, making it the most important leisure mission in historical past. Simply how large is that quantity? Even the conservative estimate – $1 billion – is greater than the mixed manufacturing budgets of Avatar, Avengers, and Star Wars. The three movies value $700 million collectively. GTA VI has damaged the document for costliest online game, beating Scopely’s Monopoly Go, which value just below a billion {dollars}, largely all on advertising and marketing, although. Genshin Affect ($900 million), Name of Responsibility: Black Ops Chilly Battle ($700 million), and Name of Responsibility: Fashionable Warfare ($640 million) spherical up the highest 5.

What made GTA VI this costly

Rockstar first started work on GTA VI after the discharge of GTA V in 2014. However the preliminary work took over three years. Precise manufacturing solely started in 2018 as soon as Purple Lifeless Redemption 2 – one other large sport from Rockstar – was launched. The event was clouded in secrecy, and no launch date was introduced. Followers and journalists famous that the sport was taking longer than normal when there was no replace until 2020. After COVID-19 struck, Rockstar allowed workers to work remotely, which slowed the event additional. For the primary time, Rockstar gave a launch date of 2025. However quickly, it turned clear that the sport would overshoot the goal. The explanation was leaks.

The primary leak to hit the sport was in 2022, when a social media consumer often known as “teapotuberhacker” revealed 90 movies to the web site GTAForums exhibiting 50 minutes of work-in-progress sport footage. Described as one of many largest leaks in online game historical past, the incident sparked a authorized conflict from Rockstar in opposition to the hacker, finally resulting in their arrest. In January 2025, one other leak confirmed gameplay on PlayStation 5. The video, posted on Reddit, was later deleted. Ultimately, a trailer got here out in Could 2025, and the discharge date of Could 26, 2026, was introduced.

GTA VI in popular culture

The delays GTA VI confronted and Rockstar’s refusal to handle them annoyed many followers. Through the years, this resulted in an web meme – ‘earlier than GTA 6’. On this, social media customers would unlikely issues happening, noting that even such a weird factor occurred earlier than GTA 6 was launched. Satirically, this elevated the anticipation for the sport much more.

All about GTA VI

Like its predecessors, GTA VI is an open-world sport set within the fictional U.S. state of Leonida, which is predicated on Florida. The sport options a number of cities and two protagonists, a change from the earlier GTA video games. The story follows a prison duo: Jason Duval and Lucia Caminos, the latter being the collection’ first non-optional feminine protagonist. Like different GTA video games prior to now, the sport parodies fashionable popular culture, with the trailer together with pot photographs at social media and influencer tradition specifically.