We finally got our first look at Grand Theft Auto VI, and Rockstar’s trailer focuses heavily on Lucia, one of the game’s two protagonists. While we don’t know much about GTA 6’s gameplay yet, an interesting detail in the game’s key art hints at a returning feature from classic titles.
The first Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer opens with Lucia in prison. A woman asks her how she ended up there, and Lucia responds with “Bad luck, I guess.” Well, Lucia’s bad luck might end up restricting your ability to explore Vice City and the state of Leonida when GTA 6 finally hits store shelves in 2025.
The game’s key art features the starring couple, Jason and Lucia, sitting on the hood of a car parked on the sun-soaked streets of Vice City. Eagle-eyed fans were quick to point out that Lucia is wearing an ankle monitor in the artwork, suggesting that she’ll be on parole during the game’s main story and under close watch by the authorities.
Just as they do in real life, Lucia’s ankle monitor could be used as a gameplay element to restrict your movement in the opening hours of GTA 6’s main story. While Grand Theft Auto V didn’t feature any restrictions at all, allowing the trio of main characters to explore Los Santos and Blaine County at their leisure from the beginning, classic GTA games were notorious for keeping players locked in a small section of the map at the start of the game.
Related: No, GTA 6’s Lucia isn’t Transgender Despite Rumors
In GTA Vice City, the bridges between islands were closed due to inclement weather. In GTA IV, the bridges were closed due to a terrorist threat. Even Rockstar’s western epic featured a variation of this mechanic, preventing Arthur Morgan from venturing too far west. With GTA 6’s map slated to be Rockstar’s biggest yet, it makes sense to restrict players to certain parts of Vice City for narrative reasons.
The ankle monitor mechanic could also play into the game’s dual protagonist system. Despite the first trailer’s focus on Lucia, both she and Jason are playable in the full game. There may be parts of the map that Lucia is unable to visit early in the story because of her ankle bracelet, forcing the player to swap to Jason. Maybe Lucia is restricted to Vice City while Jason is allowed to explore the swamps surrounding the city.
Regardless, there’s more Grand Theft Auto 6 news on the way in the future. There’s still a long road ahead to the game’s 2025 release date, and given Rockstar’s history of drip-feed marketing, it’ll likely be a long time before we see anything new from Jason and Lucia.
