Thirty-one workers who had spent years on GTA 6 arrived at Glasgow Employment Tribunal this morning to make their case that Rockstar Games sacked them over union organising.
Rockstar disputes that account, and the studio is making no effort to be diplomatic about it.
The statement Rockstar put its name to
A spokesperson for Rockstar Games issued a fresh statement signalling the company intends to contest the allegations: “Rockstar Games’ position has been clear and consistent throughout. Individuals across the UK and Canada were dismissed for gross misconduct following the sharing of confidential company information, not because of alleged trade union membership or activity. We reject the claims and will defend them vigorously before the tribunal.”
What the union alleges happened that day
The proceedings give a public airing to claims from the Independent Workers of Great Britain union, claims Rockstar firmly rejects. The IWGB argues the staff, every one of them assigned to GTA 6, were unlawfully blacklisted and singled out over their union activities. The union further contends the dismissals were themselves unlawful, having been carried out with no disciplinary process and no right of appeal.
The IWGB says employees who were in the office were summoned to meetings, informed their employment was ending immediately and walked out of the building. Those absent that day say they got phone calls that ran roughly two minutes before their work accounts were shut off.
One allegation stands apart from the others. According to the IWGB, dismissed worker Will Mesilane was forced to leave the UK for Australia after Rockstar pulled his work visa and referred him to the Home Office, with no opportunity to appeal.
Rockstar’s version involves a Discord server
The company’s stance is that the staff lost their jobs for leaking GTA 6 game features in Discord, and not over any attempt to unionize. Rockstar maintains there is no connection to union activity, and that when the dismissals took place it was unaware those being let go had any union involvement.
The total came to 34 dismissals, 31 of them in the UK and three in Canada. Demonstrations followed at the Rockstar North office in Edinburgh, Scotland, and at parent company Take-Two’s London premises.
On the Discord messages that sit at the centre of the dispute, Rockstar says they covered GTA 6 features, general development progress and release timelines, along with internal IT security protocols. The company’s view is that a leak of those remarks would have made major gaming headlines and could even have moved Take-Two’s share price.
There is a figure behind that concern. On the day Rockstar confirmed GTA 6 was slipping by six months to November 19, 2026, Take-Two’s market value plummeted $3.75 billion.
A paper trail on leaks
Rockstar has also drawn attention to its long-standing zero tolerance approach to leaks. It cited the case of an employee in Lincoln, UK dismissed in April 2025, who the company alleged passed confidential GTA 6 information to a third party that then posted it on social media. Two further dismissals were referenced: one in the U.S. in November 2023 and another in India in November 2025, each involving a separate leak of information.
The studio’s confidentiality rules are recognised as far stricter than those at most companies, and Rockstar’s position is that every member of staff is aware of that. Alinea Analytics head of market analysis Rhys Elliot recently characterised the developer’s stance on secrecy as “near-pathological.”
Both sides describe the same channel differently
By Rockstar’s account, the Discord channel used for the messages was not an employee-only private space but held hundreds of people, among them, the company alleges, staff at competing game developers, a games industry journalist and further members who could not be identified. The IWGB rejects that characterisation and maintains the channel was private.
What the workers are asking for
Their first ask is reinstatement. If that fails, they want compensation along with a tribunal ruling that the dismissals were unfair. Proceedings are scheduled to continue until October 16, a month ahead of GTA 6’s release.
Jason Lewis, former Rockstar employee and IWGB union member, said: “For almost a year, the truth about what happened to us has been buried by Rockstar and surrounded by speculation. Now we finally get the chance to put it on the record. None of us imagined that talking to each other about our working conditions would turn our lives upside down and catapult us into the centre of a global media storm. As the world prepares for the release of GTA 6, we are reliving the heartbreak of being thrown out of a project we poured so much of our lives into. We lost our jobs, our income, our community and the chance to see the game through to release after spending years helping to build it. It was devastating.”
Lewis added: “We have fought tooth and nail to get to this point, not just to be able to win justice for ourselves, but to draw a line in the sand for any employer that thinks it can attack workers for unionising. It has been an emotional journey and it is not over yet, but we can now see the finish line, and justice at last feels within reach.”
Recognition talks are running in parallel
Separately from the courtroom fight, discussions between Rockstar and the IWGB about formal union recognition remain live. Among the union’s stated demands are stronger pay transparency, safeguards against layoffs once a game ships, the elimination of “crunch,” and better flexible working arrangements. Should a deal be struck, Rockstar would become the UK’s largest recognised unionised game studio, and the workers are hoping to lock in recognition before GTA 6 launches.
The sacked staff told fans last month not to boycott GTA 6 on their behalf, and instead to buy T-shirts released to help cover their legal costs.
Alex Marshall, president of the IWGB, said: “We believe Rockstar has tried to get away with Grand Theft Employment Rights. After a year of fighting to get answers, we hope this tribunal will finally back them into a corner and bring the truth to light. As the world gets its first proper look at GTA 6, this hearing will give people a chance to look behind the scenes at what happened to the workers who helped make it.”
Marshall continued: “That is why this hearing matters for every worker across the UK, whether their job is in entertainment, education or anywhere else. It is a moment to send a clear message to each of them: you have the right to join a union, that right is protected by law, and employers cannot punish you for exercising it.”
“If Rockstar can get away with firing workers for organising, then every employer in Britain gets the message that they can do the same. We cannot let that happen.”