How does shooting and cover work in GTA 6?
Confirmed in broad strokes. The Extended Look shows cover-based shooting, weapon swapping mid-firefight and a slow-motion targeting ability for Jason, and Rockstar has since described non-lethal options. Aim assist and control schemes remain unpublished.
Confirmed — Rockstar has now shown the gunplay at length. The 26-minute Extended Look of August 27, 2026 devotes several sequences to combat, and they establish the shape of the system rather than teasing it. Cover shooting is the backbone. Weapons are swapped mid-fight — pistol to shotgun inside a single engagement — and Jason has a slow-motion ability that highlights vulnerable areas on a target.
What is not settled is the detail: no control scheme, no aim-assist options, no weapon wheel behaviour, no confirmation of whether the slow-motion ability is a meter, a cooldown or a skill that improves.
What the footage establishes
| Element | Status |
|---|---|
| Cover-based shooting | Shown |
| Weapon swapping mid-firefight | Shown |
| Slow-motion targeting (Jason) | Shown, with vulnerable areas highlighted |
| Close-quarters counters (Lucia) | Shown — see melee and stealth |
| Suppressive fire, limb shots, disarms | Described by Rockstar on August 28 |
| Aim assist and control options | Not shown |
Shooting to miss
The footage showed how the guns handle; the interviews Rockstar gave the next day explained what they are for. Head of development Rob Nelson described suppressive fire — firing deliberately wide to pin an opponent down rather than kill them — along with limb shots that incapacitate and disarming shots that knock a weapon loose. He also said the player is no longer the only dangerous party: enemies are armed and capable, and a fight escalates quickly if you allow it. The non-lethal options page covers that side in full.
The character-specific split is the notable part. Jason’s ability is a ranged one; Lucia’s strengths are shown at close range. That gives the switching system a tactical reason to exist beyond narrative convenience — a firefight where one lead holds an angle while the other closes distance.
Series precedent
GTA V had a special ability per protagonist, including Michael’s bullet-time. Red Dead Redemption 2’s Dead Eye did the same job with target painting. Jason’s ability sits visibly in that lineage, updated with the vulnerability highlighting Red Dead used for its higher Dead Eye ranks.
The cover system itself appears to be an evolution of GTA V’s rather than a rebuild, though Rockstar has said nothing to that effect and the footage is not a controls demonstration.
What is still unknown
Nothing published covers aim assist settings, first-person shooting (tracked separately on the first-person mode page), weapon customization, recoil handling, or whether the slow-motion ability is limited per encounter. Accessibility options around aiming have also not been detailed.
For everything else the reveal established, see the Extended Look breakdown.
This page will be updated if Rockstar publishes a controls or combat breakdown before launch.