Rockstar, the developer of the fan-favorite game Grand Theft Auto, may be introducing new modding features for GTA Online. The company acquired Cfx.re, the team responsible for the platforms FiveM and RedM for GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2, in 2023.

However, former employees have reported that Rockstar started the project in a bid “to rival FiveM,” in 2021 but dropped it soon. Citing an ex-FiveM employee, GTA Focal reports that developers were working on a “FiveM-Killer inside of Rockstar.” They go on to say that they were given “zero sources, zero debug symbols, and zero info”, causing the project to fail two years before they had joined the team.

They added: “They were supposed to be advising and judging our team and reporting back to Rockstar on what were like. Obviously, they were not impressed. This led to the project being revived.”

Why is Rockstar focusing on GTA Online?

This project is believed to be part of Rockstar’s strategic plans for the evolution of GTA Online, focusing on user-generated content (UGC) through its exclusive modding resources. If they are successful, GTA could transform into a platform similar to Fortnite or Roblox.

GTA Focal states that this move could help Rockstar as it will be able to manage content, host, and run microtransactions. It also suggested that this project could involve a “conversion tool from FiveM.” The fansite speculated that this transition might help Rockstar assume complete control over FiveM.

Rockstar is seemingly working on a public version of the Mission Creator.

This new script was added with the Bottom Dollar Bounties update, but is currently empty.#GTAOnline pic.twitter.com/7ZrWKoEzly

— Tez2 (@TezFunz2) July 20, 2024

In addition, a few weeks back, data miner Tez2 discovered references to a public version of ...