Now is a great time to be a Grand Theft Auto fan. Yesterday, during its Q3 earnings call, Take-Two confirmed that marketing for GTA 6 would begin this summer, effectively locking in a November 19 launch date.
The good news didn't stop there either, as Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said in a recent interview: “As far as GTA 6 is concerned, Generative AI has zero stake in what Rockstar Games is building.”
But while Gen AI will be absent from the next hit, the CEO claimed the technology is being used across the company, with “hundreds of pilots and deployments”.
It looks like Rockstar is using generative AI, just not to help it create games
During the investor call, Zelnick told attendees, “We're actively embracing generative AI. We have hundreds of pilots and implementations across our company, including with our studios, and we see opportunities to increase efficiency, reduce costs, and create the ability to do what digital technology has always allowed, which is to make mundane tasks easier and less relevant, freeing up the more amazing entertainment tasks to make our creators more interesting.”
We have hundreds of pilots and implementations across our company, including with our studios,
While his focus is on the operational benefits of Gen AI, Zelnick added, “it allows our creators to use digital tools to expand what we do, to make it even more beautiful, and even more engaging, and even more exciting,” a far cry from what he's said in previous investor calls.
Rockstar has “Many other things in the works”, even though we've been waiting 12 years for GTA 6
GTA 6 is not the only game Rockstar is working on.
In October, Zelnick told investors, “There's no creativity that can exist by definition in any AI model, because it's data-driven,” adding that if creators were to make a fully generative AI game, they “wouldn't end up with anything very good. You [would] end up with something quite derivative.” That's exactly what we're seeing as Google begins rolling out its Genie tool, designed to create game worlds with just a handful of prompts.
So what does this mean for GTA 6?
Thankfully not much.
In a separate interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Zelnick again shared how “On the topic of AI, I've been enthusiastic from the very beginning,” despite his previous comments, before allaying any concerns Grand Theft Auto fans may have had about Gen AI creeping into their games.
“Especially in the case of GTA 6, Generative AI has no role in what Rockstar Games is building,” he said. “Their worlds are handcrafted. That's what sets them apart. They're built from the ground up, building by building, street by street, block by block. They're not procedurally generated, they shouldn't be. That's what makes great entertainment.”
