Some players think that Grand Theft Auto developers can observe the game's development in detail while working. However, Rockstar's workflows are arranged quite differently – specialists often see only a small part.
Obbe Vermeij, former Technical Director at Rockstar North, recently shared his memories on social media about the development of various GTA franchise games:
The development of Grand Theft Auto III, GTA: Vice City, GTA: San Andreas, and GTA IV was more like a regular job than many imagine. Most of us worked with headphones in our zones – art, code, music – for 8 hours a day. We had very few meetings. Only a small group of people made key decisions on gameplay and story.
Especially towards the end of development, Obbe explains, a significant part of the specialists' work was fixing an "endless stream of bugs." He also noted that shortly before sending the game to "gold," the developers themselves tested the game. At such moments, they finally got the opportunity to see it in its entirety:
Interesting fact: we had a "pencils down" rule [when new feature development was paused] two weeks before the gold master. Then we all played through the game to find the last bugs. That was the first time I played the missions in order and saw the story in its entirety. There were missions I hadn't even seen before.
Rockstar Games is currently preparing for the release of Grand Theft Auto VI – the game is scheduled to be released this year on November 19 only on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S consoles. There is no information yet about the release date or release window for the PC version.