There’s a sizzling rumor about Grand Theft Auto 6 that people really don’t want to be true.
GTA Base Staff member billsyliamgta, AKA Liam, made this post all of a sudden on Twitter a few days ago:
“EXCLUSIVE: GTA VI has been internally delayed by Rockstar Games and they’re already decided on the early to mid 2026 release window.
PC is planned for around 12 – 18 months after the console launch.
This information comes from multiple devs across two studios.”
As you can imagine, the rumor has already spread like wildfire, and there seems to be a real attempt to debunk the rumor and discredit Liam. You can click through the tweet and see it has a community note, and there’s this subreddit also claiming it’s been debunked.
But we did our own double checking and that doesn’t look like it’s what happened at all.
Liam apparently mentioned Jason Schreier, asking him to confirm that he would share his own comment about it. Schreier sent this reply:
“I have never said anything about commenting on this tomorrow or at all.”
However, after that, Jason made a follow up tweet, saying this:
“Way too many people interpreting this as “Jason says there’s no delay” when all I said is that I never said anything about commenting on it.”
In another response to someone else, Schreier said, “I’m not confirming or denying anything.”
Later, Liam made another tweet, asking people to stop harassing him and sending him threats over this rumor. He also explained this about his interactions with Schreier:
“I messaged Jason expecting he’d respond back with his thoughts, but apparently he’s not gonna – or yet at least.
I intended to put in my tweet “he may come out tomorrow with a report” etc. My bad.”
You may not believe Liam, who wasn’t particularly known for video game rumors before now, or have personal experience that leads you to mistrust him. That doesn’t mean the rumor is wrong.
Schreier’s statements about this rumor suggests one of two things are true. One, he knows what Liam is talking about, but is not at liberty to talk about it. Two, he is hearing about this rumor for the first time, or realizes he has to investigate it to confirm if it’s true or not.
If you’re wondering how it’s possible that Schreier can’t talk about this rumor yet, it may be because talking about it could compromise his sources. This comes weeks after we have seen more sources corroborate the claim that Sony has some kind of exclusivity deal for Black Myth Wukong, after a lot of people were certain they had debunked it.
Here’s the truth some people may not want to accept. When we get into reporting on rumors, the facts on the ground can change, and the information networks that get us these rumors are never going to be 100 % accurate. This is the exact kind of situation where the interests of the game companies and the gamers come into conflict. So if you’re in a position to lend credence to these rumors, like Schreier, you do have to be careful about the unnecessary harm you can do when you report on a rumor.
A game companies’ stock price can tank from unsubstantiated speculation. On the flip side, gamers can make purchasing decisions they later regret because they didn’t get the games they expected to get on a platform they paid too much for. For someone like Liam, sharing what you know is clearly a thankless job, and we imagine a lot of other people are going to see this and not share information they know about Grand Theft Auto 6 or other games.
Whether you like that Liam shared this or not, the onus is now to find out if the rumor is true. If Rockstar doesn’t come out to make a statement themselves, we may need someone like Schreier to find out the truth for us.
