The fired GTA 6 developers are asking fans not to boycott the game

The people Rockstar fired want you to buy Grand Theft Auto VI. In a video the Independent Workers' Union of Great Britain published on August 18, several of the developers dismissed from the studio last October address GTA fans directly and ask them not to organise a boycott: "We spent years pouring our hard work, skill, and creativity into making GTA, and we want people to experience the universe that we helped build."

The ask has a second half. "So if you love GTA but hate union-busting, don't boycott the game, support our legal battle instead" — meaning the fighting fund covering their legal costs, now sold partly through a T-shirt run. They are explicit that this is not absolution: it does not mean letting Rockstar off the hook.

The date on the calendar nobody has marked

The reason the video landed now is a court listing. On June 17 an employment tribunal refused Rockstar's attempt to strike the union's blacklisting claims — the allegation that the company compiled information about union activity in order to act on it — and set the dates for the full hearing: September 10 to October 15. That is a five-week trial that ends thirty-five days before GTA 6 ships on November 19, and begins two weeks after the Extended Look premieres on Netflix. Rockstar's biggest reveal window and its labour case now sit in the same eight weeks.

The dispute itself dates to October 2025, when 31 IWGB members were dismissed across UK sites. Rockstar has been consistent throughout: the firings were for gross misconduct, specifically discussing confidential development information in a union Discord channel with roughly 350 members, and had nothing to do with union membership. The company won the first round — in January a Glasgow tribunal refused the workers' request for interim relief, and a Rockstar spokesperson told Kotaku the outcome was "consistent with Rockstar's position throughout", adding: "We regret that we were put in a position where dismissals were necessary." Refusing interim relief is not a verdict, and the June ruling means every union-busting allegation now goes to a full evidential hearing.

The other clock, still running

Separately and much more quietly, the developers who still work at Rockstar asked to be recognised. The Rockstar Game Workers Union filed for voluntary recognition on June 30, claiming a significant proportion of staff across Edinburgh, Dundee, Lincoln, Leeds and London, with three stated priorities: pay transparency, flexible working, and rules around crunch. Notably, the union credits Rockstar with already improving conditions ahead of GTA 6 — "unprecedented average pay rises and financial incentives for crunch for the first time ever."

Rockstar did not answer inside the ten working days that trigger the next stage, which opened a twenty-day negotiation period. As of the August 18 video there has been no announcement either way. Recognition would make Rockstar the second recognised games union in the UK after ZA/UM.

Why the boycott line is the interesting part

The obvious lever for a small union facing a multinational two months before its biggest release is the release itself. IWGB president Alex Marshall has already used the commercial framing — pointing at reported pre-order revenue to argue Rockstar "can easily afford to sit around the table." Turning that into a boycott call would be the natural escalation, and it is the one thing the fired workers have now publicly ruled out.

Read one way, that is principle: these are people who spent years on Leonida and do not want it to fail. Read another, it is accurate strategy. A boycott of GTA 6 would not work, would be blamed on them, and would cost the goodwill that is currently their main asset outside the tribunal. Either way it removes the story most likely to have dragged the labour case into launch-week coverage — and leaves September 10 as the date to actually watch.