Fired Rockstar Workers Ask Fans Not to Boycott GTA 6

Thirty-one people say they were dismissed by Rockstar Games in October 2025 for trade union activity. Their union says the final hearing in their employment tribunal claim begins next month in Glasgow, which puts it in the same autumn as Grand Theft Auto VI's 19 November launch. They are not asking anybody to boycott the game. They are asking the opposite. What are the workers actually asking for? CONFIRMED at the primary source. We fetched the IWGB's press release at HTTP 200 and 259,321 bytes. The page is dated Tuesday 18 August 2026, 8:36 AM, and carries named press contacts. Jack Hoxby, an IWGB Game Workers Branch member dismissed by Rockstar last year, verbatim: We poured years of our lives into helping build this game. We don't want you to boycott it. We want you to help us fight for justice. On what he is asking for instead, verbatim: Buy one of our T-shirts. You'll be helping to win justice for us and to defend the right of workers everywhere to come together and unionise. And on the game itself, verbatim: That way, when GTA VI comes out in November, you can enjoy it knowing that you had the backs of the people who made it. That is an unusual position for a group in an active dispute with a publisher, and it is worth stating clearly because the opposite gets assumed. Nobody quoted in the union's own material is calling for a boycott of Grand Theft Auto VI. One of the dismissed workers is explicitly asking people to buy and enjoy it. What is the dispute about? CONFIRMED at the primary source, second IWGB post, HTTP 200 at 261,722 bytes, dated 30 June 2026. In the union's own words, the dispute concerns "allegations relating to the dismissal of 31 union members in October 2025". The union says it is "challenging the dismissals through an employment tribunal, with a final hearing scheduled to begin in September 2026, where it will be decided whether workers were unlawfully fired for trade union activity". The same post says workers applied for voluntary recognition of the IWGB Game Workers Union on 30 June 2026. If that succeeded, the union says it would make Rockstar the second recognised games studio in the United Kingdom, after ZA/UM. The post names sites at Edinburgh, Dundee, Lincoln, Leeds and London. Voluntary recognition means an employer agreeing to bargain with a union over pay and conditions without being compelled to. It is separate from the tribunal claim and turns on a different set of questions. The two run in parallel, and the union is pursuing both. We have seen no published response from Rockstar or Take-Two to the recognition application, and we are not treating silence as an answer either way. Sourcing, stated plainly Everything in the two sections above is the IWGB's account, taken from the union's own published releases. The IWGB is a party to this dispute. It is not a neutral record of proceedings, and we are framing it as the union's case rather than as established fact throughout. That is not a criticism of the union. A press release from a party is a legitimate primary source for what that party says, and this one is dated, attributed and carries named press contacts, which is more than most of what circulates in this story's orbit. It is simply not the same thing as a tribunal record. When is the hearing? REPORTED by the union, and this is the honest limit of what we have. The IWGB says, verbatim, that "the final hearing of the workers' legal proceedings will begin in Glasgow next month", and in the June post that a final hearing is "scheduled to begin in September 2026". Four outlets carry a specific hearing window with precise start and end dates. We are not printing it. None of our researchers reached the tribunal record, and we do not print court dates we have not verified at source. September, in Glasgow, from the union's own releases, is what we can stand behind. We could not independently verify a precise window and we would rather tell you that than pass along a date whose provenance we cannot show. REPORTED, not verified by us. A preliminary decision in June 2026 is said to have let the claims proceed to trial. We did not verify this at the tribunal record and we are labelling it accordingly. What does Take-Two say? REPORTED. Take-Two's stated position, as quoted in the coverage of this dispute, verbatim: Rockstar Games terminated a small number of individuals for gross misconduct, and for no other reason. We took that line from coverage rather than from Take-Two directly, so we are labelling it reported rather than confirmed. It is the company's position and it belongs in any account of this dispute. Two parties describe the same dismissals in incompatible terms. That is what the tribunal exists to resolve, and it has not resolved it yet. We are not editorialising about Rockstar's character here and we are not inviting anybody to draw a conclusion about the merits. Nobody outside the hearing room has heard the evidence, and an employment tribunal exists precisely because two accounts of the same dismissal can both be given in good faith and only one of them can be right in law. It is worth noting what neither side has done. Take-Two has not, so far as we can find, published anything further on this dispute since the line above. The union has not named individual managers or called for any action against the company beyond buying a T-shirt. For a dispute now heading into its eleventh month, this is being conducted quietly on both sides. The timeline, which does the work on its own DateWhat the union says happened October 202531 union members dismissed June 2026a preliminary decision is reported to have allowed the claims to proceed 30 June 2026workers apply for voluntary recognition of the IWGB Game Workers Union 18 August 2026the union publishes the appeal quoted above, asking fans not to boycott September 2026the union says the final hearing begins, in Glasgow 19 November 2026Grand Theft Auto VI releases A hearing that the union says begins next month, over dismissals from October 2025, landing in the same autumn as the biggest entertainment release of the decade. Whatever the tribunal decides, those two things are going to be reported in the same weeks. What is and is not established Confirmed at the primary source (IWGB press release, HTTP 200 at 259,321 bytes, page-dated Tuesday 18 August 2026, 8:36 AM, named press contacts): Jack Hoxby, an IWGB Game Workers Branch member dismissed by Rockstar last year, says "We don't want you to boycott it. We want you to help us fight for justice," asks supporters to buy a union T-shirt instead, and says people should enjoy the game in November knowing they had the backs of the people who made it. Confirmed at the primary source (second IWGB post, HTTP 200 at 261,722 bytes, dated 30 June 2026): the union describes the dispute as concerning "allegations relating to the dismissal of 31 union members in October 2025" and says it is challenging the dismissals through an employment tribunal with a final hearing scheduled to begin in September 2026. Confirmed at the primary source: workers applied for voluntary recognition of the IWGB Game Workers Union on 30 June 2026, which the union says would make Rockstar the second recognised games studio in the United Kingdom after ZA/UM. The post names sites at Edinburgh, Dundee, Lincoln, Leeds and London. Sourcing limit, stated: the IWGB is a party to this dispute. Everything above is the union's account from its own published releases and is framed as such. It is not a neutral record of proceedings. Reported, and Take-Two's stated position: "Rockstar Games terminated a small number of individuals for gross misconduct, and for no other reason." We took this from coverage rather than from Take-Two directly. Reported, not verified by us: that a preliminary decision in June 2026 allowed the claims to proceed to trial. We did not reach the tribunal record. Deliberately not printed: the specific hearing window carried by four outlets. None of our researchers reached the tribunal record and we do not print court dates we have not verified. The union's own words are "September" and "Glasgow next month". Explicitly not claimed: anything about the merits of the dismissals. A tribunal has not ruled. Two parties describe the same events in incompatible terms and that is what the hearing is for. Worth repeating: the dismissed workers are not calling for a boycott. They are asking people to buy the game and support the union directly. We will report the outcome of the hearing when there is one, sourced to the tribunal rather than to either party's account of it, on our news page. Our servers list is where to go next if you are here for somewhere to play.