It’s true: nobody does it like Rockstar. Last week brought the disappointing news that GTA 6 was delayed until May 2026, but today the pill got some belated sugar coating with a frankly magnificent second trailer alongside more character details.
The game’s second trailer focuses largely on Jason and Lucia, and shows sequences from what I’d speculate is the game’s opening stretch: Jason living in a shabby beach property doing favours for his shady landlord instead of paying rent, Jason and Lucia reuniting on her release from prison, the couple getting all loved-up and vowing to improve their situation. But alongside that was an absolute treasure-trove of incidental details that showcase just how much of a leap Rockstar is taking with this game’s scale and ambition.
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It’s more grounded
The first observation is that, when you zoom out a little on everything being shown here, GTA 6’s astonishing visual style is coming alongside a way more grounded tone and world than the oft-absurd GTA 5. Obviously GTA 6 is going to deliver some incredible set-pieces and spectacle, and there’s a brief glimpse of the protagonists hanging out of an airplane, but for the most part this comes across as a world of low-level criminality, hustles and shakedowns.
GTA has at one level always been about engaging in fantasy criminality, whether that’s the carjackings of its title or going on murderous rampages and seeing how long you can survive at max Wanted level. I do wonder how those things, which I recall with great fondness from the older entries, are going to translate into this visual style and verisimilitude.
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There’s a cute nod to the 2022 hack
The trailer also opens with a gag, Jason shouting down from his roof “oh, just fixing some leaks.” GTA 6 was the subject of a 2022 hack that saw lots of footage and details splurged onto the internet (the hacker was subsequently convicted in the UK and sentenced to indefinite detention). Rockstar exerts total control over how its games are marketed and released, so all that beta footage must’ve stung, and this is them taking back control of the narrative, showing the things it wants you to focus on.
Are those RPG-lite elements we see?
The trailer shows Jason weightlifting at one point, and if you look closely at the various official screenshots and the different scenes in the trailer, his appearance is subtly different: from tan to the hair cuts. This shot instantly brought to mind San Andreas’ weightlifting minigame, which tied into that game’s RPG-lite elements around CJ’s weight and physique. GTA 6 seems to be revisiting that idea, though perhaps not to the extremes seen in San Andreas.
This also ties-in to a brief sighting of a fight club: Lucia delivers a kick within an arena as people watch on from behind wire fencing.
It looks like there are some returning characters (and Stephen Root?)
This is speculation but it certainly looks like we see Phil Cassidy at one point, the gun store guy, which would make him the second character (after Lazlo) to make the jump from the original GTA 3D Trilogy (Cassidy was in GTA 3 and Vice City, as well as the PSP spinoff games). The first name is confirmed by the gun store’s name: Phil’s Ammu-Nation.
There are reasons to think it’s not him, mostly relating to the timeframe and him having both arms, and the character could well be a relative or just a nod, but I think Rockstar’s comfortable playing around with its own history like this.
This is yet to be confirmed but Brian Hader, Jason’s shady landlord-slash-boss, sounds an awful lot like the actor Stephen Root.
It’s modern, but still feels ’80s
The setting is up-to-the-minute present day, with yet more glimpses of social media-style footage and modern technology. But the vibes are all 1980s, and among the tracks heard at different points are Wang Chung’s “Everybody Have Fun Tonight” and the Pointer Sisters’ “Hot Together”, both major ’80s hits.
Yep, Jason is named Jason
We’ve now got the full names of both protagonists. Jason gives his full name as Jason Duval when at the prison, and here we also get Lucia’s surname: Caminos. Their house also has different stuff in it at different points in the trailer, so presumably you can upgrade your pad as you progress. There’s even a PS5-style console and a PS4-style pad at one point.
There are cats!
Other things we get a glimpse of include a GTA version of Miami’s MetroRail, an elevated train system, and most exciting of all cats! You can see a cat climb out of the bins behind Brian Heder at the start of the trailer, and one on Jason’s right as he exits a store carrying a six pack of beer. The latter did make me wonder about getting drunk in-game, which we don’t see in the trailer but was a feature in previous games.
We see a big cat, too: One of the new screenshots on the website shows a panther hunting deer, suggesting that not only will we find wildlife in GTA 6, but it displays behaviors as complex as stalking and hunting.
Oh and on the beer: the characters don’t drink Pißwasser, but we do see an advert for it at one point.
One other notable animal reference is a character wearing a green football jersey with “Manatees” written on it. Manatees are also known as sea cows, so this is the GTA version of the Miami Dolphins.
There are hundreds more details to be extrapolated from this trailer, and the more I notice the more excited I am for where Rockstar’s going with this. It’ll be fascinating to see how the reactiveness of the NPCs holds up when it’s dealing with players and their actions, rather than a trailer showcase, and I can’t wait to see how environments like bars are handled when it’s not a cutscene. You have to hand it to Rockstar: this game may not live up to its promises, but what golden promises they are.
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