Rockstar Games has revealed the lengths it went to to gain first-hand experience of real-life Florida as part of research for GTA 6.
Senior vice president of narrative, Rupert Humphries, told Game Informer that developers at the studio visited strip clubs and rode around at night with ex-cops as part of research conducted in Miami and South Florida.
“We go and try to experience everything… from riding around areas at night with ex-cops, to going to strip clubs and nightclubs, spending time on the beach, in the Everglades, down in the Keys, and beyond,” Humphries said.
Of course, Rockstar has recreated Florida before in previous GTA games, but the last one featuring Vice City — GTA’s take on Miami — was 2006’s Vice City Stories. Unlike previous Vice City games, GTA 6 is set in the modern day, and things have obviously changed over the last 20 years.
GTA 6 gameplay and screenshots have already teased how the game will adapt Florida, known as Leonida in-game. The GTA 6 map has six different regions: Vice City, of course; Leonida Keys; Grassrivers; Port Gellhorn; Ambrosia; and Mount Kalaga National Park. Activities include kayaking, street and off-road racing, and air boating. We’ve also seen nightclub gameplay, beach gameplay, and plenty more.
The elephant in the room here is the strip clubs, which were featured in a high-profile GTA 6 gameplay leak that also showed off a nudist town filled with naked characters. Male and female genitalia were both fully exposed in the leaked gameplay, but it’s worth pointing out this was unofficial footage, and Rockstar hasn’t released official strip club gameplay yet. It may not do so before launch.
None of this should be particularly surprising, given this is GTA 6 we’re talking about. Most of the GTA games feature strip clubs, although not all are open for players to visit. GTA 6, clearly, takes this to another level, as it does with most gameplay features seen in previous entries.
We’ve rounded up all the major new details from Game Informer’s GTA 6 cover reveal, and we have plenty more on the game from IGN’s trip to Rockstar North last month. GTA 6 launches in November on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
