GTA 6 Has ‘Big and Small Choices’ in Its Story, As Rockstar Takes Red Dead Redemption 2’s Player Agency to the Next Level

Utsanjan Maity
August 28, 2026
GTA 6 protagonists Jason and Lucia in an open world environment

How will Rockstar Games build on the deep player connection of Red Dead Redemption 2 for its next massive open-world game? Discover how the development of the new GTA 6 protagonists, Jason and Lucia, is directly inspired by Arthur Morgan's iconic and deeply personal journey.

When Rockstar Games first announced that players would not control John Marston in Red Dead Redemption 2, a wave of skepticism swept through the gaming community. Marston was a beloved outlaw, and the idea of stepping into the boots of an unknown character named Arthur Morgan felt like an unwelcome shift. However, through masterclass storytelling and deep player integration, Arthur became one of the most celebrated figures in gaming history. Today, as anticipation builds for Grand Theft Auto 6, Rockstar is applying those exact storytelling lessons to the new GTA 6 protagonists.

To achieve this level of connection, Rockstar is studying how player agency can shape the narrative experience. The studio wants to create characters who do not just exist in a pre-written vacuum, but who actively reflect the actions and choices of the player sitting on the couch. This delicate balancing act is precisely what Rockstar North is currently focusing on as they refine the dynamic between Jason and Lucia.

Why the Legacy of Arthur Morgan Matters for Grand Theft Auto 6

It may be difficult to imagine now, but there was a time when people were disappointed that Red Dead Redemption's protagonist, John Marston, would not be leading Rockstar's 2018 sequel. Arthur Morgan was an unknown, and it was somewhat unthinkable that he could mean more to anyone than the already established Marston. John's story was already complete, tragic, and universally praised, which made convincing players to care about a brand-new lead a monumental task.

Rockstar, of course, knew that would be the case. And so, during the production of Red Dead Redemption 2, it put a lot of careful thought into crafting Arthur's tale, with the aim of ensuring Mr. Morgan could both connect with and reflect players better than even John had. And now, several years later, that same issue has been on Rockstar's mind while creating the GTA 6 protagonists, Jason and Lucia. They understand that establishing a deep bond between players and a new set of characters is essential for the game's long-term success.

In many traditional narrative games, a disconnect often occurs between what the player wants to do and what the character is forced to do. Rockstar wants to close this gap in their modern titles. By allowing players to influence the tone, relationships, and moral choices of the protagonists, the narrative becomes a shared creation. Designing compelling GTA 6 protagonists means studying how players interacted with Arthur Morgan and taking those mechanics to the next level.

How Rockstar is Designing the GTA 6 Protagonists for Ultimate Player Agency

"One of the things we are interested in exploring with these games - and it's something we did probably most consciously on Red Dead Redemption 2 - is the idea of how much of this character is them and how much of it is you, the player?" says Rob Nelson, Rockstar North's co-studio head. We spoke with Nelson as part of a recent visit to Rockstar North, and he told us about how important it is for player agency and choices, both "big and small" to permeate through the studio's stories and the characters at the centre of them.

For Rockstar open world games, this level of narrative integration is what sets their titles apart from standard action-adventure games. It requires a massive web of branching dialogue, optional scenes, and reactive world events. This is particularly important when dealing with dual protagonists who must interact with each other and the world simultaneously.

By giving players control over how these characters interact, Rockstar is breaking down the barrier between the player and the digital avatar. The choices you make do not just change a stat or a visual meter; they change how the characters perceive themselves and each other. This high level of player agency is designed to make Jason and Lucia feel like real people with complex inner lives, rather than just tools used to navigate the open world.

Overcoming the Narrative Friction of Character Decisions

"For example, Arthur - as we played through Red Dead Redemption 2, sometimes it felt like 'Why am I listening to Dutch?' He's clearly crazy," says Nelson. "You know - 'Why am I helping these people? I don't even know them.' People would ask us that, and we would say, 'Well, because Dutch saved you when you were 15 years old, when you didn't know how to read.' And they say, 'Me? He Saved Arthur.' So, we tried to do a couple of things to address this."

"We added an element to the story where Dutch is the only one who knows where Arthur's money - and all the gang's money - is, to try to create a secondary, more player-centric motivation," Nelson explains. This financial hook gave the player a tangible, personal reason to stay invested in the gang's survival, even if they no longer trusted Dutch's leadership.

"So, if it was not enough for you as the player to just take Arthur's loyalty to Dutch at face value and go along with it, we'll also try and give you a personal reason as the player to be invested for your own sense of wanting something for you," Nelson concluded. This dual-layer motivation system is a design philosophy that translates directly into the development of the GTA 6 protagonists, where both the emotional bond and the practical, gameplay-oriented goals must align perfectly.

From the Wild West Camps to Modern Safehouses in Leonida

One way you could build stronger bonds within the world of Red Dead Redemption 2 was to spend time at camp and talk to each member of the Van Der Linde gang. While a great many games feature conversation between the player's character and NPCs, RDR2's dialogue system supported both narrative-driven chats and incidental small talk, the latter of which contributed to the camp's truly authentic atmosphere.

This is something that Rockstar also aims to carry over into GTA 6, with Jason and Lucia's safehouses across the fictional state of Leonida operating more like the interactable camps of the Wild West than traditional Grand Theft Auto homes have done. In previous GTA games, safehouses were merely places to save the game or store vehicles. In GTA 6, these locations will serve as central hubs where players can interact with the main characters on a deeper level.

It's a continuation of Red Dead Redemption 2's commitment to characters leading the studio's stories. By making these safehouses interactive spaces where characters live their lives, players can experience the subtle developments of Jason and Lucia's partnership in a natural, unscripted way. This evolution in GTA 6 gameplay features highlights Rockstar's commitment to creating worlds that feel alive.

How Optional Missions and Player Choices Shape Arthur's Arc

The small choices add up to mean something, some big ones mean a lot in the moment you make them.

"We needed to make sure we had missions where you spent time with each member of the gang to try and get to know them to help the player form a connection with them," explains Nelson.

"Another thing we tried to do to enhance the player's connection to their character in that game involved any of the kind acts that Arthur was able to perform," he continued. "Originally, many of them were mandatory, but that felt wrong. So, we started taking them off the main story flow and just making them optional. So, you as a player were required to go and meet his ex-girlfriend, Mary Linton, but you didn't have to help get her little brother out of the cult, and you didn't ever have to meet her again."

"We tried to make sure that a lot of these things were optional so that, hopefully, if you wanted Arthur to have some sort of redemption arc, you felt more strongly connected to it because you helped him achieve it as a player," Nelson adds. This level of Red Dead Redemption 2 choices laid the groundwork for how player decisions will impact the GTA 6 protagonists. If players want Jason and Lucia to form a deep, romantic bond, they will need to seek out optional opportunities to foster that connection.

The Evolution of the Honor System into Criminal Profiles

That feeling of shaping your own Arthur and deciding which end of the honor meter he ended up at is a masterstroke of open world storytelling. It makes every action count, from small-time theft to life-or-death decision-making. Again, it's something Rockstar is looking to build on in GTA 6, with its equivalent of the honor system, Jason and Lucia's Criminal Profiles, changing depending on the outcome of every choice, big and small.

This, alongside how you choose to make them bond romantically, will affect the story, much like how Red Dead 2's would change in specific moments, such as whether a prowling wolf or peaceful deer appears in Arthur's dreams. The choices you make will determine how the public perceives each protagonist. Rather than forcing a static romance, the game will allow players to decide how closely bonded the criminal couple becomes.

"We also made very subtle changes to the cutscenes and [Arthur's] stated motivations for things", Nelson explained. "If you were high honor and if you as the player had been showing that you cared about these things, Arthur would tell John, 'Get out of here when this is going down. Do it for me; it would make me feel...good, I guess.' But if you had low honor, he didn't say that. He said, 'Don't be an idiot'. And it wasn't black hat versus white hat - it was just figuring out how to not make Arthur too sentimental, if that was not the way you were playing."

Subtle Narrative Nuances and the Search for Multiple Endings

"Interestingly, some people would get the low honor ending that resulted in Micah shooting Arthur in the head, and they would die face down in the dirt, and they'd say, 'Why did that happen to me?'" Nelson laughs. These subtle shifts kept Arthur's character consistent with how the player had actually played the game. It proved that choices in Rockstar open world games have real, lasting consequences.

We don't yet know how many different endings GTA 6's story may have, or how drastically it can change depending on the state of Jason and Lucia's relationship and their Criminal Profiles. It certainly seems like we'll need to spend plenty of time outside of those main missions in order to make their bond with each other, and in turn, our bond with them, ring true.

"There are lots of choices, big and small. The small ones add up to mean something, some big ones mean a lot in the moment you make them," reveals Nelson.

"It's interesting to play around with and explore these ideas, and we are definitely continuing down this path with GTA 6," he continues. "With the relationship, we start Jason and Lucia off wanting to give it a shot, but just going through the story and playing missions together may not be enough to keep them together. You'll have to keep them together by spending a bit of time together in the open world, and then hopefully that will reinforce your connection to them and increase your investment in their story."

Key Highlights from Rockstar North's Latest Preview

To better understand how GTA 6 is shaping up, here are the major insights and exclusive coverage from our recent visit to Rockstar North:

Ultimately, the success of Grand Theft Auto 6 will rest on how well players connect with its characters. By utilizing the brilliant narrative foundations laid by Arthur Morgan, Rockstar is poised to deliver an unforgettable journey with the new GTA 6 protagonists. Prepare yourself for a game where every choice matters, every relationship is earned, and every action has consequences.

Simon Cardy is a Senior Editor at IGN who can mainly be found skulking around open world games, indulging in Korean cinema, or despairing at the state of Tottenham Hotspur and the New York Jets. Follow him on Bluesky at @cardy.bsky.social.



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