In late 2025, GTA 6 studio Rockstar dismissed over 30 employees for what the company called "gross misconduct," particularly leaking "specific game features" from upcoming titles in a "public forum." That forum, it turns out, was a private Discord server where employees apparently discussed working conditions at the studio and spoke with organizers at the Independent Workers' Union of Great Britain. Newly revealed court documents from Rockstar say that one of the big new features these employees were discussing was a 32-player online mode.
This month, a judge heard from representatives of both Rockstar and the fired employees, ultimately ruling in the company's favor and denying interim relief to the affected workers ahead of the upcoming trial. In that hearing, as reported by People Make Games, Rockstar's representative barrister Andrew Burns referenced a "top secret" feature of GTA 6 revealed in employee Discord messages.
Burns didn't want to discuss this feature in public, so he asked the judge to read that message privately. Despite those secrecy concerns, the documents presented in court were not subject to any reporting restrictions, allowing PMG to view them at the Glasgow Tribunals Centre.
One message in question shared in the video above was part of a conversation about Rockstar limiting the number of employees who could take time off at once, which then mentions a large session taking place involving 32 players that was "difficult" to do.
32-player online sessions are, of course, exactly what's already offered in GTA 5's online mode – 30 players active in a lobby, with up to two more able to spectate. Numerous other Discord messages are included in Rockstar's court filings, including talk related to AI policy at the company, travel considerations, and crunch (or lack thereof) at various sub-studios. But this is the only specific game feature PMG describes in its rundown of these messages.
In Rockstar's filed grounds of resistance, the company added that it was "gravely concerned" to have discovered that employees "had been sharing highly confidential and commercially sensitive information relating to the content and features of an unannounced online service. They discussed the specific number of online players planned for this service, a material feature of this new title, which has not yet been revealed by Rockstar."
