GTA 6 will let Jason and Lucia pull off high-value jobs, but Rockstar Games asks players to work up from being small-time criminals first.
The latest peek at this week’s new Grand Theft Auto game arrived courtesy of a preview piece from The Guardian (via @GameRoll_). It included interviews with Rockstar North co-studio head Rob Nelson and head of publishing Jennifer Kolbe, who covered the kind of people GTA 6 will cater to and the kind of people it’s about.
Jason and Lucia are two names we’ve heard for years, and they’re not about to go away any time soon. After 13 years, faithful GTA fans will soon finally go hands-on with the next mainline game in the groundbreaking open-world sandbox series. They won’t be able to immediately pull off front-page heists out of the gate, though.
The Guardian said players won’t be allowed to have the duo rob Vice City jewelry stores or drive around Leonida in sports cars in the early moments of GTA 6. Instead, they’ll only be able to “hotwire low-end vehicles and pick basic locks” until they work their way up to high-value work later. What the threshold to reach those moments is remains unclear, but considering Rockstar has toiled away on the game for more than a decade, it’s probably best that players don’t burn their way to the top too quickly.
Nelson described the “younger couple” as a pair with “their backs against the wall” when we first meet them. We’ve known that GTA 6 takes after Red Dead Redemption 2 in some respects, so Jason and Lucia won’t be whipping out RPGs from their back pocket – at least at first. The piece added that robbing everything from gas stations to upscale mall boutiques might be easier or more fruitful if players take the time to complete extra steps. That might mean disabling security cameras or stealing surveillance footage, or it could mean scoping out locations for more discreet entry points.
Skip the prep and a robbery might get chaotic quickly. That’s where thinking on your toes will prove beneficial not only for your success but for Jason and Lucia, too. Judging by some of the Wanted System changes Rockstar has detailed in the past, players might want to think twice before making any knee-jerk reactions.
A more detailed and realistic world line with another new element Rockstar accounted for: empathy. As detailed by The Guardian, Nelson and the rest of the team have promised that GTA 6 includes “mechanisms for encouraging” empathy for the first time in series history. What exactly that means remains to be seen, but with many details and different ways to play, we probably won’t fully understand the developers’ vision until we meet Jason and Lucia ourselves.
GTA 6 launches for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S November 19. For more, you can check out IGN’s preview from earlier this year. You can also check out the recent leak that spilled the full track list for the game’s official album, and why we’re excited to jump into Vice City, even if it’s at 30 fps.
Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).