It was due to arrive on Tuesday, December 5, 2023 at 3 p.m. French time, but the first GTA VI trailer was ultimately brought forward by several hours. Indeed, following a leak which began to spread on TikTok and Twitter, Rockstar Games made the decision to publish the trailer for the most anticipated game of the decade at 12:11 a.m. and thus counter these unwelcome leaks. Has this damaged the popularity of this trailer? Of course not, since the video has already been viewed more than 46 million times in just 8 hours, proof that the wait among the players was crazy. This trailer, lasting 1’31 min, tells a lot of things and this science of teasing, of laying the foundations of a universe, of teasing us in such an intelligent way everything we are going to have in their game, Rockstar Games is one of the few players in this industry capable of doing this. It is obvious that the trailer will be analyzed shot by shot, dissected because a lot of elements are mentioned in such a short time: the characters, the city, the atmosphere, the future missions that we are going to do, the satire of culture American of course, and by extension the decline of the Western world, while placing easter eggs here and there.
We are here precisely to see all this together, and we will start by talking about the choice of music, which is also not the result of chance. Because Rockstar Games never does anything randomly, you know that well. First of all, it’s the song “Love is long road” by Tom Petty. Beyond the fact that at Rockstar Games, we have always had good taste in music, you should also know that the intro to Tom Petty’s song is simply reminiscent of the intro credits of the series CSI Miami , or CSI Miami for the original name. Listen carefully to both music, we are on the same musical tone. Even the city map recalls the images from the credits of the TV series, just like this passage with this airboat which takes us to the Everglades and the pink flamingos which take flight. Everything is there, right down to the colorimetry of the image.
We will now focus on the two central characters of this GTA 6, which is therefore a couple. We knew this since the Rockstar Games hack in September 2022, it is confirmed with the trailer. Lucia and Jason therefore form a Bonnie & Clyde-style couple, who will live their American dream by carrying out a series of heists. What we see in 1″30 min of trailer is that it’s Lucia who leads the dance, it’s she who wears the pants in the couple I have the impression, and damn, what charisma , we already feel that she is going to have a great trajectory in terms of writing. Frankly, if we can find Sadie Adler’s bad-ass attitude, that would be incredible! The trailer allows us to see that she will get out of prison and try to reintegrate into society. Jason is deliberately put in the background in this trailer, he is even erased, and this is obviously wanted on the part of Rockstar, who is undoubtedly teasing the fact that for the 1st playable female character in a Rockstar game, she had to stand out. Even in the main illustration, Lucia is in the background, but her look is so imposing that it’s her who stands out in the image. Afterwards, without doubt that Jason will be introduced in more depth in a future trailer, he will not just be Lucia’s foil either, the two will undoubtedly be on an equal footing, but in this trailer 1, it is Lucia who heads it.
Vice City is therefore also confirmed, but unlike previous GTAs, it is not the Vice City of the 80s. Here, we are today, in 2023, with in particular the emergence of social networks, the deep evil of our societies, which is eating away at Humanity and contributing to the decadence of the Western world. And Rockstar Games will obviously take advantage of this new GTA 6 to once again highlight its satirical writing, they won’t be shy. In the trailer, there is a strong representation of smartphones and this need to film everything to post everything online, like this scene where a young woman gets out of her convertible to catch the wind on the American highway and be filmed by a guy in front. RS, here we are, and rumors suggest a real use in the gameplay of the game. We see image formats like TikTok and Instagram, with likes everywhere, people ready to put on a show, either by dancing in bikini on luxury yachts, or twerking on the roof of a car, with the added bonus of having a vice day that I love. Besides, people who thought that GTA 6 would be a watered-down episode due to the time, but the trailer proves that Rockstar does not forget that GTA is also casualness and vulgarity and a lot of images prove it again.
The other element that blew the world away was the level of graphics. We are clearly on in-engine for this first trailer, as always with Rockstar Games, but we have reached a pretty crazy level in terms of visual rendering. And besides, how can we doubt it after what was done with Red Dead Redemption 2 which remains the most technically accomplished open world, even in 2023, no one has managed to match it, to do better. Beyond the superb DA, the richness of the settings, the incredible lighting, the density of the city, it is above all the NPCs which fascinate. They are extremely detailed, of great variety, with animation loops that promise to be grandiose, and above all represent America in all its splendor, whether in terms of communities, but also physically, with characters body-builders, but also bigger, fatter bodies, everyone is represented, it’s quite crazy this richness in variety.
Easter egg level, we can already see a meta message in the words spoken by this old woman in a nightgown and 2 hammers in her hand: “Look who’s back?” As a reference, who is back after 10 years of waiting? GTA obviously! There is also this banner at the start of the video which tells us “Why Sixty Nine when you came nine 1 nine” which is therefore a reference to a famous strip club in Miami, e11even Miami. At the end of the video, when Lucia and Jason open the door with a bang, we see this message taped to the door which indicates the establishment will refuse cash that comes out of underwear, We will no longer accept cash stored in underwear.
GTA 6 will be released in 2025 on PS5 and Xbox Series, no mention of a PC version yet. According to rumors, you will have to wait 1 year after the console versions.
