Every New Frame from Edge, Up Close

Aaron Garbut, co-studio head at Rockstar North, tells Edge you can play a quieter life if you want: buying cigarettes and beer, taking the train for the day, or going to a club. "You can have your life in the game," he says. Edge doesn't describe what you can do inside a club.

GTA V switched between preset conditions. In GTA VI, Garbut says, clouds move on their own, shaped by wind, humidity, fog, time of day and season, and you can watch a storm form in the distance. Edge says flying through severe weather can buffet an aircraft, and staying in it can cause light damage.

Rob Nelson, Rockstar North's co-studio head, says that when the team tried GTA V's timings, "everything felt too fast" for a world this detailed. Edge says sunsets now linger and nights stretch out. Roads were narrowed too, to "a more believable size."

Picking a getaway car is its own risk now. Edge reports that some drivers flee, others are armed and fight back, and newer, expensive cars can carry a tracker that keeps broadcasting your position. A holdup can also go wrong when a shopper decides to play the hero.

Edge adds a detail: during a getaway you can switch characters, leaving the wheel to the computer while you take the passenger seat and the gun. "It's AI," Nelson jokes, "but the good, old-fashioned sort."

In Nelson's demo, a botched robbery ended with the pair fleeing on a stolen motorcycle. Police laid a stinger strip that Nelson missed at night, the front tire blew, and both were thrown over the handlebars. Then a police dog joined the chase and pinned Jason, while everyone in the room urged Nelson not to shoot it.

What Edge does explain is the Criminal Profile, which runs from "Professional" to "Irredeemable" and which Rockstar says influences how the story unfolds. Fights don't have to end in a death: you can incapacitate someone, or try threats first.

Edge describes a "heat" system built on what the police know: your description, your clothes, whether you were alone, whether a camera caught you and what weapon you carried. Icons on screen show that report. Split up, change clothes or drop the weapon, and you match it less.

His example to Edge: a town might be unusually patriotic, have a biker gang that loves the police, and be in the middle of a mayoral race, and the jokes spread from there into ads, characters and overheard talk. Edge doesn't say this frame is that town.

Edge describes races finding you on their own: in the demo, a 4x4 with purple underglow pulled alongside Nelson's old station wagon and kept taunting until Nelson accepted. Edge calls these semi-scripted encounters and says the world is heavily seeded with them.

Edge says a Los Angeles team of writers, directors and producers worked on making Leonida's people individual, with around 600,000 animations. Each person has traits such as temperament and aggression that shape how they react to you.

Earlier reports from Game Informer put Leonida at more than 170 animal species, fish included. Edge does say wind and waves change how boats handle, with islands and buildings sheltering some stretches of water.