GTA 6's Missing Data Suggests It Might Be Censored In Certain Regions

Missing Data Has GTA 6 Fans Worried It Might Be Censored In Australia And New Zealand Source: Rockstar Published Nov 10, 2026, 5:00 AM EST Josh Coulson is an editor at TheGamer covering breaking news on everything from colorful platformers to the latest Lego sets. Primarily a news writer since 2018, Josh has covered just about every major game from the past decade. Now an editor, their focus has shifted to being the leading affiliate expert at the site, building relationships between TheGamer and global brands including Mattel, Funko, and The Pokemon Company. Sign in to your TheGamer account Pre-loading for GTA 6 has begun. That means you can put the game on your console right now; you’re just not allowed to play it yet. It also means people who know how to do so can take a peek inside some of the GTA 6 files, and they’ve quickly discovered something interesting. Actually, they’ve discovered something interesting is missing. Tex2 has listed GTA 6’s PlayGo chunk metadata (thanks, VGC). PlayGo is effectively the PlayStation equivalent of Xbox Smart Delivery, splitting the data into chunks so that those chunks can then be divvied up depending on what a particular system needs. Source: Rockstar It’s largely used to divide up what’s needed for last-gen and current-gen versions of the same game. However, it can also be used to remove certain elements of a game in select regions. That appears to be what has happened here, and Tex2 points out that one of those chunks is missing from GTA 6’s metadata in Australia and New Zealand. GTA 6’s metadata is split into three categories: story, minigame, and core. It’s a core section that has been omitted from the version of GTA 6 being sold Down Under, which suggests it's something out in the game’s massive open world that will be missing. The size of the missing chunk is small, just 704 KB. Hard to believe there’s anything that small in a game that’s now confirmed to need more than 200 GB of free space, no matter where you plan to play it. That tiny file size suggests whatever it is that’s missing from GTA 6 in Australia and New Zealand, it’s not something anyone is likely to miss. It’s so small, and GTA 6 is so big, that it might be something we take months to even find. Why Something Might Have Been Censored In GTA 6 In Australia And New Zealand Source: Rockstar The file size suggests that this is probably a texture of some sort that has been removed, potentially for legal reasons. Australia somewhat infamously has stricter rules than other parts of the world when it comes to drug use in video games that give you a gameplay advantage. It can, and has, resulted in games being refused classification. Perhaps that missing metadata chunk is linked to that specific kind of drug use in GTA 6. It’s now only nine days until we can play GTA 6 and try to solve the mystery ourselves. Those playing in Australia and New Zealand will get a head start too, since the game will launch there first due to the time difference. They will need to wait for the rest of us to solve this missing data mystery, though, as they’ll need people outside of that region to know what it is that’s missing. Systems Released November 19, 2026 ESRB Rating Pending - Likely Mature 17+ Developer(s) Rockstar Games Publisher(s) Rockstar Games Engine Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE) Genre(s) Action, Adventure