The busiest week in Rockstar Games’ history just got busier. On November 12, the same day GTA 6 preloads start, Rockstar’s UK staff will begin voting on whether to recognize a union. The ballot closes November 26, a week after the game launches on November 19. If it passes, the people who built the biggest release of the decade will have a formal say over their pay, overtime, layoffs and how generative AI gets used in their jobs.
The Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) announced the vote this week, and its president didn’t undersell it. Alex Marshall called the ballot “just as historic as the game release,” as UNILAD Tech reported. “But for workers at Rockstar, it is so much more personal: it is fundamentally a choice about whether you get to have a say in how your day-to-day life is organised.”
The short version
- Rockstar’s UK employees vote November 12 to 26 on recognizing the IWGB Rockstar Game Workers Union.
- The ballot is on a recognition deal agreed between the union and management after talks that began in July.
- A yes vote would give staff collective bargaining over pay, bonuses, overtime, redundancies, flexible working and generative AI policies.
- Rockstar’s head of publishing says, “If they want a union, they will have a union.”
- It all runs alongside a tribunal over the firing of more than 30 staff in 2025, with closing arguments on November 17 and 18.
How Rockstar got from firings to a ballot
A year ago, this looked like a fight, not a vote. In late October 2025, Rockstar fired more than 30 UK employees for what it called “gross misconduct.” The company said they had broken confidentiality rules by sharing information on a Discord server. The IWGB said the fired workers were union members discussing workplace issues and called it union busting. It filed legal action over what it described as “unacceptable and unlawful” dismissals, and about 220 Rockstar staff signed a petition supporting their former colleagues. The UK government publicly called for talks about protecting workers’ rights.
Then the tone shifted. Months of negotiations between the IWGB and Rockstar management produced a recognition deal, which is what staff will now vote on. Earlier this month, Rockstar head of publishing Jennifer Kolbe told Bloomberg, “We go where the team goes. So if they want a union, they will have a union.” That’s an unusually open line from a major publisher in the middle of a launch.
The firings haven’t gone away, though. The tribunal over those dismissals is still running, and closing submissions land on November 17 and 18, two days before launch. Rockstar has denied the union’s claims. According to Game Developer, the vote is taking place independently of that case.
What a yes vote would change
Union recognition in the UK means the employer agrees to negotiate with the union on behalf of a group of workers, instead of setting terms alone. Here’s what the IWGB says the Rockstar deal would put on the table.
| Area | Why workers care |
|---|---|
| Pay and bonuses | Union members point to a gender pay gap they say they can’t properly address without more transparency |
| Overtime | Staff describe “uneven and ever-changing” overtime pay policies |
| Redundancies | Concerns about job security once GTA 6 ships and the big push ends |
| Flexible working | A say in hours and remote work arrangements |
| Generative AI | Input on how AI tools are introduced into art, writing and development work |
Rockstar union committee member Shanti Easton-Steel framed it around openness. “For me, this vote comes down to ensuring employees at Rockstar get honesty and openness surrounding the decisions that affect them,” she said. “When management choices are kept hidden, we can’t properly address issues like the gender pay gap, the uneven and ever-changing policies on overtime pay, or the concerns many co-workers hold around job security post-release.” The union also says a yes would make it the largest recognized union in UK games, a claim that hasn’t been independently checked.
The AI clause is the one to watch. Game studios are under pressure to cut costs with generative tools, and unions are increasingly treating AI as a bargaining issue rather than a management decision. Blizzard’s union recently won the right to bargain before Microsoft can use AI on their jobs, and a Rockstar deal would put the same question on the table at the industry’s most valuable studio.
Rockstar has doubled in size since its last big launch
Part of why this matters is scale. When Red Dead Redemption 2 came out in 2018, Rockstar had 2,441 employees, according to Bloomberg. It now has 4,711 spread across 12 offices. That’s a lot more people with a stake in what happens after launch, when big studios often reshuffle teams or cut staff.
The money is bigger too. Take-Two says it expects $8 billion in revenue in its 2027 fiscal year, helped heavily by GTA 6. The franchise is so valuable that even a leak can move the stock: when footage escaped this summer, the fallout erased $2.8 billion of Take-Two’s market value in three days. With that much riding on one game, the people making it have leverage they’ve rarely had before.
Rockstar also has history here. Ahead of Red Dead Redemption 2, co-founder Dan Houser said some staff had been working 100-hour weeks. Houser later clarified that he meant a small senior writing team over a few weeks, but current and former developers pushed back on that account, and “crunch” became shorthand for the studio’s reputation. A recognized union would give staff a formal channel to raise those issues before the next big push, not after.
Will this affect GTA 6?
No. The vote doesn’t touch the release date, and nothing about it involves a strike or any work stoppage. GTA 6 is still set for November 19, with preloads starting November 12. If you’re planning your launch week, here’s how much storage GTA 6 needs on each console, because on an Xbox Series S it could eat more than half the drive.
Results should arrive after November 26, roughly a week into GTA 6’s launch. Whatever happens, Rockstar staff will have made history twice in one month, once with the game and once with the ballot.
Sources and further reading
- UNILAD Tech: Rockstar staff set to make historic decision during GTA 6 launch
- Game Developer: Rockstar workers to vote on unionization ahead of GTA VI
- Aftermath: Rockstar workers set to officially vote on union as GTA VI comes out
- Bloomberg: The making of Grand Theft Auto 6
- DualShockers: Rockstar employees could make history with union vote
- Institute of Employment Rights: Rockstar workers set for historic union vote
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