Grand Theft Auto 6 Trailer: Franchise’s First Female Protagonist, Vice City Return and 2025 Release Date

Jordan Moreau
·2 min read
268

More than 10 years after Grand Theft Auto V first came out, the first look at the long-awaited and highly anticipated sequel, Grand Theft Auto VI, has officially been released. Rockstar Games dropped the first trailer to the massively hyped video game on Monday night after it first leaked online. Fans will have to wait a while longer to play it, however, because only a 2025 release window was teased.

Grand Theft Auto 6 stars Lucia, the franchise’s first female protagonist, and takes place in the Miami-inspired Vice City — which was the setting for 2002’s Grand Theft Auto entry. Lucia is the main character alongside an unnamed male lead. The two have a very Bonnie-and-Clyde relationship of love and crime.

More from Variety

The trailer shows plenty of beaches, boats, bathing suits and bayous. There are people racing cars along crowded highways, cruising speedboats through the water, flying places over the city and driving dirt bikes in traffic — hinting at just a few ways players will travel through the city.

There appears to be some kind of in-game social media network based on X/Twitter that shows videos of people partying on boats, a man pulling an alligator out of a pool and a woman twerking on top of a moving car. It wouldn’t be Grand Theft Auto without crime and mayhem, and it looks like there will be plenty of police chasing and bank robbing — with the help of a reptile or two — in store for the latest game.

Tens of thousands of fans were waiting to watch the Grand Theft Auto VI trailer when Rockstar Games made the YouTube link available on Monday morning. More than a decade after its release, Grand Theft Auto V is still one of the most popular games ever made. It has sold more than 190 million copies and generated over $7.7 billion in revenue to date. With 300 million copies, Minecraft is the only game that has sold more copies than Grand Theft Auto 5.

First launched in 1997, the Grand Theft Auto series has become one of the most popular, and notoriously violent, video game franchises of all time. Games take place in a large open world, usually modeled after a real-life location, and players can steal cars, evade the police and commit countless types of crime. Grand Theft Auto V, released in 2013, was the first game that allowed players to control three distinct characters: Michael De Santa, a rich, retired bank robber; Franklin Clinton, a gangster trying to make it big; and Trevor Phillips, an unhinged drug dealer and psychopath.

Watch the trailer for Grand Theft Auto 6 below.

Best of Variety

Sign up for Variety’s Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.