Co-creator of GTA, leaves Rockstar Games
On 11 March 2020 Dan Houser, co-creator of Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption, leaves the Rockstar Games company for good. Unfortunately, the reason for this surprising decision remains a secret.
Two days before the release of the newest financial report of Take-Two Interactive, the Internet was hit with a surprising news – after nearly 20 years with Rockstar Games, Dan Houser, the company’s co-founder decides to leave. Dan ran the enterprise together with his brother, Sam. He teamed up with a former chief of the Rockstar North studio, Leslie Benzies and were responsible for the biggest company brands, including Red Dead Redemption and Grand Theft Auto.
The information was announced by Take-Two Interactive via a special document. It reads that Dan Houser will permanently leave Rockstar Games on 11 March this year. It’s worth noting, that for a while now, precisely for a year, he’s been less active, since going on prolonged holiday. Unfortunately, the document doesn’t reveal the reasons for these two decisions. Additional information gained by Gameindustry.biz portal from Take-Two Interactive only says that “the role of the other co-founder Sam Houser in the company will remain unchanged”.
Crunch Controversy and Tax Exemption Accusations
The information spreaded only a few days after, when Rockstar Games boasted about their excellent results of the Grand Theft Auto 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2 games, in whose creation the Housers had played significant roles (as for the first game alongside Benzies). It’s also worth recalling an interview given by Dan Houser for the Vulture portal in 2018. The subject of crunch in Rockstar Games was mentioned in it, which took place while developing the Red Dead Redemption 2 ( up to 100 working hours per week). Houser later explained, he’d been misunderstood and he related only to a team of scriptwriters to which he also belonged, but the milk had already been spilled. Also, one can’t omit recent controversies related to the Rockstar North studio – it was accused of abusing the tax exemption program (TEP) for game developers in the UK.
At present, Rockstar Games and the Rockstar North team are working on Grand Theft Auto VI.Rumour has it that the production is to be released in the fall of 2021 – at first for Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles. How will Dan Houser’s departure impact the future of the game? We’re going to find out in the following months.
