Everything ‘Grand Theft Auto VI: An Extended Look’ Just Revealed About the Year's Biggest Game

Netflix just dropped a 27-minute preview of the series’ long-awaited, secrecy-shrouded return to Vice City. Here's everything we learned.All images courtesy of Rockstar GamesWe’re just months away from what might be the most anticipated release in video game history. For the game industry, Grand Theft Auto VI is such a juggernaut that it basically has the month of November to itself; as soon as the game’s release date was locked in, multiple games moved their own release dates up or back to stay out of its way.But for such a seismic, industry-altering release, we’ve learned surprisingly little about GTA VI—until today, when a lengthy and long-awaited trailer shed unprecedented light on what’s certain to be one of 2026’s biggest entertainment releases in any medium.Okay, I’ll bite: What is Grand Theft Auto?Simply the biggest series in modern gaming, full stop. Though the first Grand Theft Auto came out on PC in 1997, the series didn’t really hit its stride until 2001’s Grand Theft Auto III, a PlayStation 2 game that codified most of the tropes of open-world gaming (essentially, running around on a big map, doing missions or whatever else you want). Though the franchise has been insanely popular for 25 years and counting, it managed to hit new heights with 2013’s Grand Theft Auto V, which is, by a margin of more than 100 million copies, the highest-selling AAA video game of all time. Based on hype alone, Grand Theft Auto VI is poised to be even bigger; there’s a very real chance that the game will make more money on the first day of its release than any piece of entertainment in human history has earned in a 24-hour period.So what do we know about it?Until today, not much. Rockstar, the game’s developer, has been teasing GTA VI since December 2023, when the first trailer formally revealed that the game would be set in Vice City—the series’ fictionalized take on Miami and the surrounding area. (But not too fictionalized; this is Florida we’re talking about, after all.) Since then—perhaps because they correctly recognize that a new Grand Theft Auto is the definition of a product that sells itself—Rockstar has guarded details about the game with a level of security typically reserved for state secrets or nuclear codes.This secrecy has driven many fans to desperation, if not outright insanity. The first trailer and a second one—released in May 2025—were pored over for tiny details with as much obsessiveness as JFK conspiracy junkies applied to the Zapruder film, though neither contained any actual gameplay. With so much curiosity and so little to fill it, something was bound to give. It finally did: Despite Rockstar’s best efforts, a hacker (or group of hackers) working under the name Cyberleek started releasing brief clips of the game, perhaps from an early test build, while promoting a memecoin that they promptly rug-pulled today, making off with some $250,000 even as Rockstar continued to hunt the leakers. It was all very Grand Theft Auto.Why today?Maybe because—at last!—we have our first serious, official look at GTA VI, making leaks look mundane and irrelevant by comparison. In partnership with Netflix, Rockstar released Grand Theft Auto VI: An Extended Look, a 27-minute trailer showing off everything players can expect from the latest GTA. (It’ll also be on YouTube later tonight.)What’s in the trailer?Though there’s no narration, or any other context beyond what’s happening on screen, An Extended Look appears to be structured around three major missions from different portions of the game. In the first, Jason and Lucia—the two characters players will be controlling—fight their way out of a drug den when it’s raided by cops. In the second, Jason and Lucia join a would-be criminal employer on a bullet-riddled car chase through the streets of Vice City. And in the last, Jason and Lucia play private security for some kind of rich failson when a fancy party is interrupted by masked assassins.Jason and Lucia? What’s their deal?They’re a Bonnie & Clyde-esque couple trying to get rich through the vast array of criminal opportunities in Vice City. They come by crime honestly; a previous trailer revealed that Lucia gets out of prison near the start of GTA VI. One of the major running threads in An Extended Look is the state of their relationship. They banter, or maybe bicker, over how long Lucia takes to get dressed, or whether or not they’re too late for a high-stakes meeting. At one point, a prompt suggests that the player can push R2 to make them hold hands. One report suggests that the relationship will be dynamic, allowing players to control either or both Jason or Lucia at will (and—based on how you play—affect the arc of their relationship, including ending their romance). That’s borne out by An Extended Look, which showcases real-time swapping between the two characters, apparently prompted by the player at the push of a button.So what do you do in this game?An Extended Look shows plenty of the expected activities: Driving cars, shooting guns, meeting with various sleazy criminals (including a cigar-smoking beach rat unmistakably voiced by Stephen Root). But a brief supercut late in the trailer shows off what seems to be a dazzling variety of side activities: Playing basketball, scuba diving, weightlifting, and kayaking; driving dirt bikes, fan boats, kayaks, and rally cars; patronizing (and potentially robbing) gas stations, diners, and strip clubs; and running into a variety of weirdos, including an elderly woman toting a hammer and an incredibly annoying streamer doing something called the “Trunk Challenge” in a car Lucia is unlucky enough to have stolen. All of this is set in an open world—according to one streamer who got an early look at the game—that’s twice as big as the already gargantuan map in GTAV.How does the gameplay look?Truly impressive. Grand Theft Auto has always had top-of-class world-building, but the gameplay—especially in the earlier games—has always had some quirks. Shooting, in particular, could be floaty and imprecise, lacking the heft of the best third-person shooters. That seems to have been fixed here, with gunplay that doesn’t resemble any previous Grand Theft Auto so much as one of Rockstar’s most unjustly underappreciated gems: 2012’s Max Payne 3. The driving and handling of the game’s vehicles also seems to have gotten a major upgrade, as well as the player’s ability to affect other cars; in the lengthy car chase in the middle of An Extended Look, shooting out the tires of the police cars chasing you makes them spin out or flip with ultra-realistic, apparently unscripted real-time physics.What’s the tone of the game?Grand Theft Auto games have always juggled their crime stories with a heaping of satire pointed at American life, culture, and politics. Broadly, GTA VI looks closer in tone to Grand Theft Auto IV, a more serious-minded entry set in Liberty City, the franchise’s answer to New York. But An Extended Look also includes signs that the game will squeeze plenty of American satire into the margins, including a note-perfect parody of an antidepressant ad and a commercial for a meaty fast food sandwich that contains a mere 30,000 calories.Any other details I should know?Fans will surely find more as they pore over the trailer over the next few days, but a few things stand out immediately. At one point, Jason pets a dog and gets a little stat boost, implying that the game will have a real-time morality system based on the player’s actions. Carjacking, too, seems to be more complicated, with one parked car giving Jason the option to break in with a slim jim or smash a window. And then there’s the music—always all-important when you spend so much time driving around, listening to the radio. An Extended Look includes songs including the Bellamy Brothers’ “Let Your Love Flow,” Depeche Mode’s “People Are People,” Cliff Richard’s “Devil Woman,” and (former Vice City Stories star!) Phil Collins’ “Against All Odds.” Rockstar’s Rupert Humphries has also revealed that the game will include nods, both musically and narratively to Florida’s explosive real-life hip-hop scene.Okay, I’m sold. When can I play it?November 19. Schedule your vacation days from work while you still can—chances are you won’t be the only one calling out that week.