GTA 6 fans slam unexpected cancellation of original game

Apparently three different scripts were turned in for GTA 6 before Rockstar went with the final one.

The development cycle of Grand Theft Auto’s sixth installment has been pretty long, but at least we’re in the final stages of waiting.

It’s been 12 years since GTA 5, and we’re still just under a year out from being able to play GTA 6, so it’s just a little bit longer.

Now, we might have just seen why it’s taken so long, as a new claim by Fravilys has provided some context on early versions of GTA 6 that were cancelled during pre-production.

According to Fravilys, there were “three different versions of the GTA 6 script developed by Dan Houser [Rockstar co-founder],” which were subsequently turned down by Take-Two and prompted Houser to leave in 2020.

Of course, take this with a grain of salt. Insider Gaming is also calling the source “unproven”, so take that however you will. It does explain the long development cycle of the game, however.

Apparently, GTA 6 was always going to be set in Vice City. The first version of the script allegedly had three protagonists like GTA 5: a seemingly incorruptible police officer, the son he’s trying to protect, and the right-hand man of a Colombian drug lord hoping to start his own empire in the United States.

Fravilys claims this version of the script was in development until 2016 before Take-Two cancelled it for being “too dark”.

Following this, the script was rebooted twice. The first changed the protagonists to a police officer seeking revenge for the murder of her father, and a drug smuggler who was “quite crazy like Trevor”.

This version was in development for another 18 months, before another script rewrite. In the final rewrite, the police officer character was replaced by “a former soldier who had just left prison and fallen into the criminal underworld”.

This version was then in development until March 2019, when it was cancelled again and Houser went on sabbatical from the company for a year until his departure.

The next script for GTA 6 then used ideas from the last rewrite, but split it up across two characters to make a “Bonnie and Clyde” style story.

In the GTA 6 we're getting, Jason is the former soldier, while Lucia is the one getting out of prison. This version of the game was approved by Rockstar and went into development at the end of 2019.

“I wish they went with something darker,” wrote a fan on Reddit. “I really liked the tone of L.A. Noire.”

“That one with the cop and the bad son and the narco sounded like a decent game without the GTA name attached to it,” wrote another.

“Bonnie and Clyde setup is absolutely perfect for a GTA game,” wrote another. “They made the right call in the end.”

If the claims by Fravilys are true, then it means GTA 6’s long pre-production cycle was largely down to the extensive script rewrites at Rockstar.

However, it’s worth noting that Take-Two is pretty hands-off when it comes to creative decisions at Rockstar, so the constant veto-ing of scripts seems out of character for the company.

But at the same time, I don’t know if playing as a police officer in a GTA game is particularly that compelling, even if they are corrupt. Maybe Rockstar should do another L.A. Noire instead.

Whether you believe it or not, when you factor in COVID-19 and other delays, it becomes pretty clear that GTA 6 was not meant to take this long to develop, and could have been released years ago if these issues had not occurred.