A Former Rockstar Games Dev Explains Why GTA 7 Development Won’t Take As Long

Fans are eagerly awaiting the arrival of Grand Theft Auto VI. The game has taken several years even to reach a point where it could be properly announced to the public. However, we know it’s coming, and we should finally have it in our hands next year. That said, it seems like GTA 7 might not take anywhere near as long to release into the marketplace. That’s according to a former developer at Rockstar Games.

We’ve been waiting for marketing materials to provide a clearer picture of what we can expect from GTA 6. Still, that hasn’t stopped rumors from already moving on to its successor installment. Obbe Vermeij was a former technical director at Rockstar North, where he worked from 1995 until his departure in 2009. This former developer has been vocal online about his time at Rockstar Games and the projects they worked on.

However, thanks to Dextero, we’re finding out that he was recently featured on KiwiTalkz. During the interview, Obbe noted that GTA 7 shouldn’t take as long to make or be as expensive. That’s due to the advancements we’re seeing in AI. He believes that AI will soon play a significant role in game development, allowing costs to remain low and developers to continue producing these massive video game projects.

An example he gave was allowing AI to render the characters in a cutscene. That first pass could be AI, allowing developers to make some necessary tweaks. That said, he notes that while AI might replace some of the workload of developers, there will still be a need for standard developers to make the story and most of the art.

That’s, of course, been a hot topic as AI can take over the jobs of developers. We’ve even reported on a rumor that Microsoft is making some big moves with AI. However, if this does come to fruition, as Obbe noted, it might allow developers to take more risks and deliver niche games that would have been passed on otherwise. That’s something we’ve heard the director behind Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 hopes to see happen sooner rather than later as well.