It’s one of the most eagerly anticipated video games of all time, of course, so GTA fans were on their toes when Rockstar announced a release date of May 26, 2026 for their latest Grand Theft Auto game. And come November those looking forward to GTA 6 could feel the game’s launch was within reach (just 6 months away!).
Rockstar, though, may have doused their enthusiasm, as many felt like a bucket a cold water had been poured in their heads when the US company revealed that they would be delaying GTA 6 until November 2026, the game’s launch date now feeling much more distant…
“We are sorry for adding additional time to what we realize has been a long wait, but these extra months will allow us to finish the game with the level of polish you have come to expect and deserve”, said Rockstar in a statement on X.
This felt even more annoying to some as the game had already been delayed once, not meeting its original November 2025 release date.
However, this delay and the latest one were to be expected for several reasons.
First, GTA 6’s predecessor (GTA V of course) has had a very long shelf life. The game has sold a whopping 220 million copies as of November 2025. Meanwhile, GTA Online has become on hell of a cash cow for Rockstar and its parent company Take Two, contributing to gains of almost $2 billion US dollars in the company’s second quarter (as was recently reported on IGN).
So while it’s now been more than 12 years since GTA V hit the shelves, Rockstar can afford to sit pretty and take its sweet time with GTA 6.
And taking their time developing the latest Grand Theft Auto game is something many argue they should do, as expectations are sky high for GTA 6, especially in light of the latest trailer, which to be honest did look fabulous…
It’s clear that GTA fans who’ve poured an ungodly number of hours into GTA V and GTA Online won’t accept anything else than perfection when the next Grand Theft Auto game lands next fall, and who can blame them…
After all, GTA V has a Metacritic score of 97 (for the PS3 version of the game), while the earlier GTA IV (remember Nico Bellic anyone?) scored a whopping 98 on Metacritic back in the day.
Also, GTA 6 is being worked on by thousands of developers worldwide, with all 10 Rockstar studios involved in the project. It’s a massive undertaking, and coordinating so many people and studios across the world must be one hell of a challenge, so Rockstar and Take Two must have decided to get their foot off the accelerator and give their teams more time to breath and realize their vision… “When our competitors go to market before something was ready, bad things happen”, Take Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said in an interview.
Sadly we won’t get to meet bikini girl (aka Lucia) until next fall.
Besides this, there’s also the fact that, quite simply, Rockstar has a history of delaying its games. It happened with its cowboy adventure Red Dead Redemption 2 back in 2018. Originally slated for a 2017 release, the game was delayed twice, it not hitting the shelves until October 2018. And GTA V was famously delayed too… Many gamers were frustrated when Rockstar announced the game would not meet its spring 2013 release date, it instead not arriving until late 2023. Also, the PC version was delayed a whopping three times, meaning PC gamers were left tapping their fingers on more than one occasion (note: there’s no PC version announced for the upcoming GTA 6).
Patience is a virtue as they say then, but in this case GTA 6 better be worth the wait for Rockstar’s and Take Two’s sake. But as stated earlier the latest trailer does look great, with the game taking players back to Vice City (not 80’s Vice City but a modern-day version of it). This modern Vice City will likely also be teeming with side activities for players to enjoy, but it also looks to be a far cry from the 80’s Vice City seen in the earlier GTA: Vice City game.
GTA 6 also leaves the previous game’s criminal trio behind, it instead having a new pair of protagonists in Jason and Lucia. After a bank robbery goes wrong, they find themselves on the run, becoming embroiled in a state-wide conspiracy. It would be a great thing, then, is this is as engaging and fund as the earlier Grand Theft Auto games were, and with millions of gamers worldwide looking forward to its release in 2026, this hopefully won’t see any more delays, so GTA fans will finally be playing this most-anticipated game come next fall.