Summary

  • GTA 6 set for 2025 release in Vice City with two main protagonists.
  • Despite competition, GTA 6 likely to dominate as a highly anticipated title.
  • GTA 6 offers a unique modern crime experience that sets it apart from other open-world games in 2025.

After 12 years, $8.6 billion in sales, and endless memes, Grand Theft Auto 6 is seemingly nearing release. Gracing consoles the world over in 2025, players will step into the shoes of two protagonists as they make their way through the seedy underbelly of Vice City, Rockstar’s loving sendup of the greater Miami area.

Despite the hype, 2025 is looking to be a pretty stacked year for open-world games and their fans. Grand Theft Auto 6 is just one of dozens of titles coming out next year that are going to be vying for gamers' attention. It’s unlikely that sales will struggle for such a juggernaut of a title, but there might just be a possibility that GTA 6 faces a little more competition than Rockstar was initially hoping for.

Artwork from GTA 6 featuring Lucia and Jason leaning against a vintage car, with a vibrant background and palm trees,
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GTA 6 Doesn't Have Much to Worry About Despite a Stacked Year for Games

2025 is shaping up to be a huge year for major releases, especially in the open-world department. While GTA 6 is definitely the most high-profile release of the year, there’s some strong competition for gamers’ attention when it comes to open-world experiences.

Open World Games Coming out in 2025

  • Death Stranding 2: On the Beach
  • Assassin’s Creed: Shadows
  • Fable
  • Mafia: The Old Country
  • Tom Clancy’s The Division: Resurgence
  • Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2
  • Avowed
  • Atomfall
  • Dune Awakening
  • Grand Theft Auto 6

Why Rockstar Doesn’t Have Much to Worry About From the Competition

It should be pretty obvious why Rockstar isn’t sweating its competition when it comes to releases next year: it’s GTA 6. It’s one of the most hyped games of all time, if not the most hyped. Fans have been waiting with bated breath for this game for three whole console generations. Many will surely make time for it when it comes out, no matter what else may be released the same year or even the same month. In this way, Rockstar likely already has a guaranteed hit on its hands.

But another, more practical reason GTA 6 is sure to find its niche in 2025’s open-world games is that it ultimately fills a niche that none of the other releases do. All the other open-world games releasing next year are sure to be great titles in their own right, but they offer pretty fantastical experiences in fantasy worlds. Dune Awakening might let players explore the wastes of Arrakis and Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 might let them take on the role of one of the franchises iconic bloodsuckers, but nothing quite scratches the same itch that GTA 6 will satisfy . The only one that might come close is Mafia: The Old World, but even that looks to be more of a period piece focusing on the earliest days of the Mafia in 20th-century Italy. It’s going to be a far cry from the modern-day world GTA 6 is going to give players free rein over.

GTA as a franchise stands in a league all its own in more ways than one. It is the open-world game that all other open-world games aspire to be like. It has name recognition, and delivers an experience that none of the competition is going to be trying to match in the next year. There’s really nothing stopping Rockstar from taking its most anticipated title ever and smashing even more records. There are plenty of open-world titles coming next year, but there’s only one king of the genre. And the king is coming back to take the throne.

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Grand Theft Auto 6
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Action
Adventure
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Systems
PlayStation-1 Xbox-1
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Released
November 19, 2026
ESRB
Rating Pending - Likely Mature 17+
Developer(s)
Rockstar Games
Publisher(s)
Rockstar Games
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WHERE TO PLAY

DIGITAL
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Grand Theft Auto VI heads to the state of Leonida, home to the neon-soaked streets of Vice City and beyond in the biggest, most immersive evolution of the Grand Theft Auto series yet.

Jason and Lucia have always known the deck is stacked against them. But when an easy score goes wrong, they find themselves on the darkest side of the sunniest place in America, in the middle of a criminal conspiracy stretching across the state of Leonida — forced to rely on each other more than ever if they want to make it out alive.

Engine
Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE)
Franchise
Grand Theft Auto
Genre(s)
Action, Adventure