Guns, cars and chihuahuas: Breaking down the GTA 6 extended look — Engadget

RESOLVING THE LEDGER

Here's what those Netflix viewers got to see ahead of the YouTube crowd.

Netflix is the exclusive home of Grand Theft Auto VI: An Extended Look for six hours on Thursday, August 27, starting at 3PM ET. And then at 9PM ET, the trailer will go live on the Rockstar Games YouTube channel for everyone to dissect.

In the meantime, here's a breakdown of what the GTA 6 extended look has to offer:

First, the general setup. GTA 6 is set in Leonida, a fictional version of Florida, and it follows Jason Duval and Lucia Caminos, a Bonnie and Clyde-style duo who stumble upon a statewide conspiracy after bungling a bank heist. The game's map includes Vice City, the Leonida Keys (including fake Miami), plenty of swamplands, at least one national park and a seaside port. You play as Jason and Lucia at different points in the game, and this is the series' first time featuring a non-optional female protagonist.

We begin with Jason and Lucia picking up from a dealer in a run-down apartment complex lined with suspicious security guards, people hanging out in common areas and at least one pettable dog. Playing as Jason, the duo find their contact in a room where people are busy making crack, dressed in underwear and masks, mixing, mashing and cooking in the background. Their contact, Ray, has thick dreads, a chest full of tattoos and two heavy gold chains, and the lighting hits each detail differently, filtering through his locs and shining off his jewelry. The environmental details in GTA 6 are rich, indeed.

But damn it — it's a raid. The cops burst in and the action starts, with Jason at the lead. Jason crouches behind a table with a pistol and cleanly takes out a few enemies with Lucia following. They head down the hall and continue to shoot people, Jason hot-swapping a shotgun as needed. The pair banter as they flee, eventually ending up in a random, adorable old lady's apartment and jumping out the window.

Cue a quick intro montage, and then Jason and Lucia are chilling at home. Lucia's hair is the true narrator here, changing with each new scenario, letting us know time has passed. Her hair was braided and pulled back in the first scene, but now it's wrapped up in a messy bun, loose. They're getting ready to go out, doing cute couple things in their cozy, well-decorated apartment. Jason wanders the space, watches a few silly ads on TV, and they leave when Lucia is primped and dressed in a tight pink cocktail dress. They drive away in an old-school red convertible, chatting while Depeche Mode plays on the radio.

In another montage, Lucia reloads a shotgun with one hand, tossing it in the air, racking it, and catching it back in the same palm. A subsequent string of scenes shows Lucia in a short blonde wig, tied up next to Jason as they struggle to escape. They meet up with old friends who offer them dangerous jobs. There are numerous sequences of Jason and Lucia robbing small shops and convenience stores, bandanas pulled over their mouths and guns blazing. And, of course, they steal a car or two.

At one point, Lucia wears a sick leather jacket with a skeleton stitched into its back — and, yeah, you can see that it's stitched, the lines of texture and the bubbled fabric around the bones.

In a new scene, Lucia and Jason pick up a dude who's on the run, and they flee with Lucia driving. Red and blue lights on their tail, Jason gets in the back seat and starts shooting an automatic rifle out a back window, taking out helicopters and cop cars. Here, you can clearly see six stars in the upper-right of the screen, signaling a return to the classic maximum Wanted Level.

The perspective eventually swaps to Lucia, who's on a mission to prove she can handle this life, and as the driver she successfully evades authorities while Jason and their contact keep shooting. They torch the car, get in a van, and disappear.

In another montage, Jason and Lucia ride a fan boat, go to clubs, throw an influencer in their trunk and go base-jumping.

The final setting has Lucia in a slick black bob and Jason in a casual suit, preparing to board a private plane. They're running security for an important guy during a corporate gala, and they get separated. We follow Jason, Lucia in his earpiece, as he finds his target doing lines with friends in a dark office away from the party. Obviously, gunfire breaks out on all levels of the building. Jason crouches behind boxes, desks and corners, shooting enemies as they careen into view. He activates bullet time, adding red and yellow splotches to his target and allowing him time to line up a good shot. Meanwhile, Lucia is gunless, and she fights off an attacker by stabbing him in the eye with her heel. Shortly after, she's tackled down an elevator shaft.

The final montage rolls. Its highlight is a small chihuahua dressed in a purple tutu with little fairy wings, but it showcases scenes from across Leonida.

The extended look ends with a note saying it was captured on a standard PS5. It's difficult to judge its graphical fidelity and framerate from a low-bitrate Netflix stream, but GTA VI appears to hold 30 frames per second during the majority of the footage shown. All told, it looks like a fun place to be.

Rockstar Games The extended look follows a few rough weeks for Rockstar. A loud contingent of fans are upset with the studio over the price and contents of the GTA 6 physical edition — namely, the fact that it doesn't include physical media at all, and instead will be a code in a box at launch. And, like the digital edition, it'll cost $80, officially ushering in a higher price standard for AAA games.

News of the physical edition dropped at the end of June, and on August 18, the GTA 6 leaks started landing. Videos and screenshots of the game hit the internet, showing its map, icons, RPG features and combat mechanics from Jason's perspective. The initial leak included a message from the uploader about "fighting for gamers' rights" over the code-in-a-box situation, offering ...

Guns, cars and chihuahuas: Breaking down the GTA 6 extended look — Engadget | AIPROPX