It's been more than 18 months since the last trailer for Grand Theft Auto 6 was released. A few weeks ago, developer Rockstar announced it would break its long silence with a special "extended look" at the highly anticipated video game in a 30-minute special on Netflix. But the run-up to the splashy preview has been potentially overshadowed by a string of apparent leaks which appear to show footage of GTA 6 in action.
Rockstar has not publicly acknowledged the clips, nor replied to any requests for comment, since the first leaks appeared on Wednesday. But there's plenty to suggest the material that's been posted online is genuine. The developer's parent company, Take Two Interactive, launched legal proceedings regarding the leaks in a New York court on Friday.
BBC Newsbeat has obtained the filings, first reported by video game website Kotaku, external, demanding Microsoft-owned site GitHub and chat app Discord turn over the user details of accounts thought to be sharing "copyrighted material". Copies of clips are being quickly removed due to copyright claims, and multiple accounts claiming to belong to the group behind the hacks have also disappeared. Many fans have described this as a "nightmare scenario" for the company, but BBC Newsbeat has spoken to experts and a former Rockstar developer who say the reality is a little more nuanced.
Obbe Vermeij is a game developer who worked as a technical director on major GTA titles including GTA 3, GTA Vice City and GTA San Andreas until he left Rockstar in 2009. The company's games have grown bigger and more complex since, with thousands of staff worldwide working on each one. "It's amazing that they can keep things under wraps as well as they do," says Vermeij.
Rockstar is renowned for being tight-lipped about its projects, and Vermeij says this has long been the company's culture. "We always wanted to keep things a secret," he says, "it makes launch day so much more fun. "People would just go home with their disc and they were just excited about the game that they knew very little about." Video game journalist Wesley Yin-Poole, director of news at IGN, says the apparent leaks will be tough for the game's developers.
"GTA 6 is an enormous endeavour," says Yin-Poole. "It's being built over the course a decade, essentially, with thousands of people involved. "To have the game exposed in this way will have been devastating to many people who worked on it." The group behind the apparent leaks claims to be acting in the interests of players, accusing Rockstar of engaging in anti-consumer practices, such as its decision not to release a disc version of GTA 6 at launch.
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