GTA 6 main story can't be rushed, Rockstar tells Edge

If you plan to race through Jason and Lucia's story in one long weekend, expect Rockstar to slow you down on purpose. In a feature in the latest issue of Edge magazine, Rockstar explains that GTA 6's campaign won't always hand you the next story mission the moment the last one ends, according to reports from Voxel and HobbyConsolas. Some missions will first ask you to wait, raise a set amount of cash, track down a character or try out a side activity.

How GTA 6's story pauses work

HobbyConsolas reports that Rockstar calls these "natural pauses" in the story (that's the Spanish outlet's translation). The examples it lists are simple: a mission that stays locked until you have enough money, a prompt to go and find someone somewhere on the map, or a side activity that a later story mission builds on. According to HobbyConsolas, part of the aim is to stop players from chaining main missions back to back and to push them out into Leonida to try the side content and minigames.

The outlet adds that Rockstar North's Rob Nelson first brought up the idea in August. It also compares the system to Red Dead Redemption 2, which sometimes made you wait before the next story mission opened up.

Voxel offers some nuance: the gates don't make a fast finish impossible, but they make planning a lot more important. That matters for the streamers who want to get there first. HobbyConsolas points to Kai Cenat and ElRubius, who have both said they want to be among the first to beat the main story. The outlet expects the most impatient players to find ways around the pauses, though that's its own guess, not something Rockstar has said.

Paying your way forward with WAINK

When a mission needs money, Voxel's summary of Edge says you can earn it through side work such as holding up stores or stealing specific cars and delivering them to fences. A phone app called WAINK shows which vehicles are in demand, along with details on their security and tracking. Pricier cars can tip off the police to where you are, and the payout depends on what state the car is in when you hand it over.

Jason and Lucia want out

The Edge feature also gets into the story itself. According to Voxel, one of the protagonists' goals is to leave the criminal life behind. The game opens with Jason and Lucia together and willing to give their relationship another go, and that wish for a different future runs straight into the jobs they still have to pull. Nelson acknowledged that many players see the series as a power fantasy, Voxel reports, but said the pair are after more than money: their ambitions are tied to their future and their relationship. You can read up on the pair in our GTA 6 characters guide.

Voxel also describes a criminal profile system that tracks how Jason and Lucia behave on a scale that its Portuguese report renders as running from "Professional" to "Irredeemable". The way you handle each situation feeds into it. In a fight, for example, you can disable enemies or try intimidating them rather than killing everyone, while a more violent approach can push the profile the other way, possibly with consequences for the story.

What Rockstar hasn't explained

Neither report says how often these pauses come up, how long they last, or how much cash the steeper missions demand. We'll have to wait for launch on November 19, when GTA 6 arrives on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. For more from the same Edge coverage, see Aaron Garbut on beating fan expectations, and our GTA 6 everything we know guide for the bigger picture.