Grand Theft Auto 6’s massive leak has claimed another victim, as many online users make bad faith comparisons of the leaked gameplay toSaints Row’s latest release. For the uninitiated, a hacker has seemingly gotten into Rockstar files and shared videos of earlyGrand Theft Auto 6gameplay. They also reportedly have access to theGTA 5andGTA 6source code, which is going to be devastating if it leaves the hacker’s hands.
If the source code forGTA Onlineis accessible by the wrong people, cheaters and hackers will overtake the online game. The leak alone is creating a huge PR fire forGTA 6and Rockstar, and it’s not impossible the source code leaking online leads to some form of delays as Rockstar has to address its security. This is going to be something that takes some time to resolve, and its short-and-long-term effects could be catastrophic. Developments are ongoing, butSaints Rowhas been an unintended victim.
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Saints Row has been trending on Twitter as many feel the need to argue thatGTA 6’s early leaked gameplaylooks better than the new, officially released game. That’s simply not true. On the one hand, it’s not the oddest comparison givenSaints Rowwas once seen as a major alternative toGrand Theft Auto 6,but on the other hand, these just come across as opportunistic, vitriolic comments on top of an already bad situation.Saints Rowlooks better, objectively, than the leaked gameplay. One is done, one is nowhere near.
Furthermore, this conversation is coming from another bad faith spot: many have unjustly criticized the leaked gameplay. By most reports, this comes from a 2019 build, and it’s incredibly early in the game’s development cycle. It’s an unfinished product by definition; it’s like looking at an unfinished car and judging it based on the final sale product. If anything, theGrand Theft Auto 6leakshows how much work goes into refining a game and how many iterations of a build there are. All of these are bad faith arguments based on a bad faith action, complete with tons of fundamental misunderstandings.
While this is, in and of itself, unfair to the games being dragged in likeGTA 6andSaints Row, it’s worse for the devs. Rockstar employees who have worked on this game for years are being subjected to seeing their work heavily criticized and likely worrying about how this is going to impact their ongoing work. And now, Deep Silver Volition employees may see their work unfairly compared to that, just for the sake of argument. No one wins in this situation; fingers crossed that this fire dies down instead of continuing to spread.
Saints Rowis available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
