A claim has been spreading over the past few days that Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier said Grand Theft Auto VI is 90 percent finished. He did not say that. He has never said that. The number is real though. What he actually said, in the opening seconds of this video, is that he's is roughly 90 percent certain the game will make its November 19 release date without another delay.
This is not the first time Schreier has been misread on this exact subject. Back in January, he mentioned on a podcast that the last he had heard, the next Grand Theft Auto was not yet content complete, meaning the team was still finalising missions and deciding what would make it in. He then had to publicly correct the record, pointing out that his actual position was that he would not be surprised if the game does come out on schedule, and noting rather pointedly that anyone could have simply asked him.
With that said, a game can be a long way from finished and still ship on time, and it can be nearly finished and still slip. Knowing how complete a game is tells you surprisingly little about whether it makes its date, and knowing that a date looks solid tells you almost nothing about how much work is left.
With GTA 6 coverage running on little official information since the pre-order confirmation on June 25, fans are, once again, scrambling to find something to chew on. Rockstar Games continues to release very little about the upcoming game, and the silence is what's basically fueling this enormous demand for something, anything, that feels like a concrete update. A specific number attached to a credible name is perfect fuel for that. It sounds like insider knowledge, it fits in a headline, and it gives people a figure to argue about.
Except, most of the time, it's all GTA 6 hype and much ado about nothing. We are not standing outside that machine, either. Every outlet covering this game, ourselves included, is operating in the same information drought, and drought is exactly when misreadings spread fastest.
For what it is worth, Schreier's actual reporting here is reasonably encouraging. It also lines up with the hard evidence. Take-Two Interactive has reaffirmed November 19 in filings rather than just interviews, pre-orders have been live since June, and prices and editions are locked in across every region.
A month has also passed since Schreier made that 90 percent comment. In game development, four weeks near the end of a project is a long time.
Ultimately, nobody outside Rockstar knows how complete the game is. The closest we'll find out more about the game is when Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick talks to shareholders in August.
