GTA 6 60fps limitations were possibly confirmed by Rockstar years ago

The road to Grand Theft Auto VI has been a stressful one. Between the delays and Rockstar’s approach to marketing, it’s fallen to fans to keep the hype alive through online discourse.

A marketing campaign is expected to start this month and due to Rockstar’s recent lack of activity on Bilibili, we’re adamant that the third trailer could be dropping as soon as today, July 23.

Aside from the trailers though, one of the biggest conversations taking place regarding the game is the framerate, and it’s becoming a tiresome debate.

Rockstar Games

Will GTA VI run at 60 frames-per-second at launch? That’s the big question on everyone’s mind and it’s one neither Rockstar or Take-Two have provided a concrete answer for. All that’s been said is GTA VI “plays best” on PlayStation 5.

Consider this though: Rockstar gave us its answer years ago and it all leads back to Red Dead Redemption 2.

Why GTA 6 probably won’t run at 60fps on console - and why that’s okay

The latest Red Dead Redemption game launched on Xbox One and PlayStation 4 back in 2018, on consoles that weren’t capable of supporting 60fps.

Since then we’ve had the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 Pro, both of which can support 60fps, and yet we’re still waiting on a new-gen optimisation update for Red Dead Redemption 2.

Sure, you could argue Rockstar is too busy working on GTA VI to be updating Red Dead Redemption 2, but the studio has thousands of employees and still supports GTA Online with new heists. It definitely has the manpower to update a last-gen game for modern consoles.

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The real reason is Rockstar doesn’t care, and that’s not a criticism. It’s actually a good thing. Rockstar would rather spend the bulk of its efforts making a great game than one that pushes hardware to its limits.

GTA VI might “play better" on PlayStation 5 but the differences will be marginal at best, and analysts reckon it won’t even hit 60fps on the PlayStation 5 Pro let alone the base console.

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It’s probably one of the reasons why Rockstar won’t release a day-one PC port. Sales on consoles far outweigh PC sales anyway, but it’s also much more manageable to nail a launch on Xbox and PlayStation, then port it to PC at a later date.

While the radio-silence is frustrating, Rockstar Games does truly care about its product and playerbase, otherwise it wouldn’t have delayed the game as much as it has already.

If GTA VI does end up running at 60fps on the more powerful consoles, it won’t be because Rockstar has been up all night trying to make it happen. It’ll be because it was both possible and wouldn’t conflict with the overall vision of the project.

Records are almost guaranteed to be broken when GTA VI launches on November 19, but Rockstar has still been under pressure from day-one to release a game that’s worth the wait, and if pushing the game to 60fps will jeopardise that, it won’t happen.