Last week, over 30 developers were fired from Rockstar Games. A trade labor group claims the Grand Theft Auto 6 studio was union busting, but Rockstar Games now claims the employees were leaking sensitive information. The dispute comes just as the long-awaited blockbuster is getting ready to ship in May 2026.
“Last week, we took action against a small number of individuals who were found to be distributing and discussing confidential information in a public forum, a violation of our company policies,” a Rockstar spokesperson told Bloomberg. “This was in no way related to people’s right to join a union or engage in union activities.”
Rockstar did not immediately respond to a request for comment clarifying the nature of the confidential information that was allegedly disclosed.
The ex-Rockstar developers were in a private message group on Discord with the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) when they were fired last week for what parent company Take-Two called at the time “gross misconduct.” The IWGB has been seeking to organize developers across various UK-based gaming studios, including Disco Elysium maker ZA/UM and MindsEye maker Build a Rocket Boy.
“Management are showing they don’t care about delays to GTA 6, and that they’re prioritizing union-busting by targeting the very people who make the game,” IWGB president Alex Marshall told Bloomberg in response to Rockstar’s new allegations. He maintained the fired employees were only discussing issues related to “exercising their rights for a fairer workplace and a collective voice.”
The IWGB did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
GTA 6‘s release date has already slipped once and some are placing bets that it could miss the new May 26 release date as well. The game has had one of the most secretive development cycles of any major blockbuster, outside of the details leaked in an unprecedented hack back in 2022. Since then, Rockstar has only released two official trailers.
