Rockstar Employees Could Make History With Union Vote During GTA 6 Launch

Rockstar’s UK employees will vote next month on whether the company should formally recognize the IWGB Rockstar Game Workers Union. The anonymous online ballot runs from November 12 to 26, placing GTA 6's November 19 launch right in the middle of voting.

The vote follows months of talks between Rockstar management and union representatives. The Rockstar Game Workers Union (RGWU) says employees will decide whether to approve a recognition agreement that would give them a formal say in workplace decisions. If they vote in favor, the IWGB says Rockstar would have the UK games industry’s largest formally recognized union.

Rockstar Workers Want a Say on Pay, Overtime and AI Policies

If approved, the agreement would give Rockstar employees a say in matters including pay and bonuses, overtime, layoffs, flexible working arrangements, and the company’s policies concerning generative AI. The union has also raised pensions and parental leave as issues it wants workers to have more influence over.

Union organizing at Rockstar did not begin with this ballot. Workers have been organizing since 2019, and employees requested formal recognition in June at the company’s offices in Edinburgh, Dundee, Lincoln, Leeds, and London. The union and Rockstar began discussing a recognition agreement in July. Staff are now being asked to vote on the deal that came out of those negotiations.

If they vote in favor, the IWGB says Rockstar would have the UK games industry’s largest formally recognized union.

Rockstar had also said it would recognize a union if GTA 6 staff wanted one earlier this month. Speaking to Bloomberg, head of publishing Jennifer Kolbe said, “If they want a union, they will have a union.”

RGWU committee member Shanti Easton-Steel has raised concerns about the gender pay gap, inconsistent overtime policies, and job security after GTA 6 launches. She argued that employees struggle to address those problems when they cannot see how management reaches decisions that affect them.

Easton-Steel also linked the timing of the vote to the work employees have put into GTA 6, saying they have a chance to make gaming history “not once but twice.” Employees at Disco Elysium developer ZA/UM secured the UK games industry’s first formal union recognition agreement in October 2025, and that deal was also negotiated through the IWGB.

Vote Overlaps 2025 Firings Lawsuit

The ballot takes place alongside a separate employment tribunal involving workers Rockstar dismissed in October 2025. The company fired 34 employees across the UK and Canada, 31 of whom were union members, according to legal filings examined by Game Developer. Twenty-three former employees are challenging their dismissals in Glasgow. The IWGB alleges they were targeted for union activity, while Rockstar says the dismissals followed breaches of confidentiality rules involving a Discord server.

Lawyers representing the former workers allege Rockstar monitored organizing activity and singled out union members after membership crossed a threshold relevant to formal recognition. Rockstar denies firing anyone for union activity and argues that confidential material was shared in a Discord channel accessible to people outside the company.

Closing submissions in the case are expected on November 17 and 18, during the recognition ballot and immediately before GTA 6’s release. The dates were reported by Kotaku after the hearing ran beyond its original October timetable. The tribunal has not announced when it will deliver a decision.

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Action Adventure Systems OpenCritic ReviewsReleased November 19, 2026 ESRB Rating Pending - Likely Mature 17+ Developer(s) Rockstar Games Publisher(s) Rockstar Games 8 Images

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