Grand Theft Auto V, a game notorious for its explosive heists and chaotic sandbox, might have just witnessed its own real-life drama with a potential source code leak fueled by, of all things, spite. Rumors swirled around the gaming industry on why this leak happened and what exactly it all came from. This is just a rumor, so take it with a grain of salt, but it has a lot of support.
I’ll tell the whole thing from start to finish because it’s so convoluted that it took me time to really get it all together. Even the tweet with the messages and other news outlets explaining it didn’t make much sense.
This tale of digital larceny reportedly began with a group buy, where a crew of modders pooled their resources to snag the coveted GTAV source code for a mere $2,000. Supposedly, among them was Kieron Austin, a modding figure known by various aliases like TMP and TickleMePickles. What makes this interesting is that, in this report, Austin allegedly contributed nothing to the initial buy, hitching a free ride to the source code vault.
Austin, perhaps emboldened by his free admission, supposedly attempted to flip the code for a cool $6,000, aiming to double his ill-gotten gains. The market wasn’t buying, so he tried his luck again, hawking the code on Discord for a bargain-basement price of $199. In this rumor, getting the code would cost him nothing, and he’d gain $199.
Leaked Discord chats allegedly painted a picture of a disgruntled seller, spouting threats of a full leak if his bargain-bin prices weren’t met. With no buyers lining up and his get-rich-quick scheme seemingly DOA, Austin reportedly did the unthinkable – he flooded the internet with the source code, a digital Molotov cocktail tossed in the direction of Rockstar Games and the modding community.
This is all based on chats released that could very well be faked. The consequences of this alleged leak are still unfolding. What we know is that feathers are ruffled in the modding community, but Rockstar Games remains tight-lipped. Whether this was a reckless act of spite or a completely different course of events is still to be seen.
After all this, the most perplexing thing was that the source code for Grand Theft Auto V may have only been $2,000. That would be the most wild reveal.