GTA 6 review copies reportedly watermarked

Rockstar has reportedly watermarked GTA 6 review copies so that each reviewer's name flashes on screen, a measure meant to trace any leaked footage back to its source. The claim comes from content creator ManaByte, who said on X that the watermark reads something like "REVIEWER_NAME_001" and that a leaker or outlet could be blacklisted from future Rockstar releases, as Beebom, Notebookcheck and TwistedVoxel each reported.

Tom Henderson, the Insider Gaming reporter, corroborated the report and called it "fairly standard stuff" for Rockstar, according to Beebom. TwistedVoxel reported that Henderson said remote review copies commonly carry safeguards of this kind across the industry, and that Rockstar is taking additional precautions ManaByte did not mention. Henderson did not describe those precautions.

ManaByte said the watermarks could be moving, or appear as a transparent grid of names covering the footage, which would make it harder to blur out of a recording, Beebom and TwistedVoxel reported. ManaByte also said Rockstar held supervised review events for GTA V in 2013, and that watermarking review copies is new for the GTA series.

Separately, TwistedVoxel cited the leaker Nate the Hate as saying review codes are now going out to media, with the embargo lifting November 18, 2026, a day ahead of launch on November 19. TwistedVoxel also reports that the pre-load opens November 12, 2026 at midnight local time on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S, with the latest version pre-installed and a possible update closer to launch.

Whether the watermarking holds, and what the review builds show, is not yet known.