Fired Rockstar Workers: Don't Boycott GTA 6
The workers suing Rockstar Games have asked Grand Theft Auto fans not to boycott GTA 6 on their behalf. In a video published by the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain on August 18, former Rockstar staff dismissed in October 2025 made the opposite request of the one people had been expecting: buy the game, and put money behind the tribunal case instead.
“We poured years of our lives into helping build this game,” said Jack Hoxby, one of the dismissed workers. “We don’t want you to boycott it. We want you to help us fight for justice.” The video’s framing line is blunter still — don’t boycott GTA 6, “win justice for the people who helped make it.”
Why this is a deliberate choice, not a soft one
Consumer boycotts are the default reflex when a studio is accused of mistreating staff, and the timing here made one look almost inevitable. The tribunal’s final hearing runs September 10 to October 15, finishing about five weeks before launch, and the marketing campaign peaks in exactly that window. A boycott call would have landed in the loudest possible news cycle.
The workers declined to make one. The reasoning they give is authorship: they worked on this game, and a boycott punishes the thing they built rather than the company they are suing. The union has been careful to add that this is not absolution. Fans should not, in the workers’ words, let Rockstar off the hook — the ask is redirection, not forgiveness.
There is also a practical logic. A boycott of a game with pre-orders Take-Two has called unprecedented would not move the company’s numbers in any measurable way. A legal fund, by contrast, is a cost the claimants actually face, and one where a small number of supporters makes a real difference.
What they are asking for instead
The union is running a merchandise fundraiser in place of a boycott: a “Rockstar 34 Solidarity” t-shirt, designed by the workers themselves, with proceeds going to the fighting fund covering the case. The IWGB also takes direct donations to the same fund.
| Detail | |
|---|---|
| Video published | August 18, 2026, by the IWGB |
| The ask | Buy GTA 6; fund the case rather than boycott |
| Fundraiser | “Rockstar 34” solidarity t-shirt, plus direct donations |
| Final hearing | September 10 – October 15, 2026, in Glasgow |
| Launch | November 19, 2026 |
The number in the shirt’s name explains a discrepancy
Coverage of this dispute has cited 30, 31 and 34 dismissed workers more or less interchangeably, and the shirt’s name finally resolves why. Thirty-four people were dismissed in total — 31 in Britain and 3 in Canada. The UK employment tribunal case covers the 31 British claimants, because a UK tribunal is where their employment claims are heard. The union counts all 34 when it talks about the group.
So the figures were never in conflict. One is the size of the legal case; the other is the size of the group the union is fundraising for. Our earlier reporting used 31 throughout, which remains the right figure for the tribunal itself.
Rockstar’s position is unchanged
The company has consistently said the dismissals were for gross misconduct — that the staff distributed confidential information — and has called the union-busting characterisation false and misleading. The union says the firings were retaliation for organising, and the tribunal has already refused Rockstar’s attempt to strike the blacklisting allegations before trial. No findings of fact have been made either way; that is what the September hearing is for.
Nothing in this week’s video changes the legal position. What it changes is the shape of the public argument going into launch, and it removes the one outcome Rockstar might reasonably have feared most from a labour dispute running alongside the campaign.
What to watch
The next fixed date in the dispute is September 10, when the hearing opens in Glasgow. It runs to October 15. Before that, Rockstar’s own calendar reaches An Extended Look on August 27, the first substantial new GTA 6 footage since Trailer 2 — and, on current scheduling, the two stories will be competing for the same attention through September.
For everything Rockstar and Take-Two have actually stated about the game itself, our confirmed roundup tracks the official record. This page updates if the hearing dates move or either side issues a further statement.