The streets of Grand Theft Auto 6’s Leonida are bustling with all sorts of zany characters who help bring Rockstar’s satire of Florida to life. Typically, this fictional mass of non-playable plebs find a balance between being complete randos and looking realistic enough to be believable. Potentially, you could point to any character in the GTA 6 trailers so far and be able to find at least one human being IRL who looks uncannily familiar to that NPC; we’ve got a population of over 8 billion to work with here. But there are now two totally different instances where fans think that Rockstar lifted the likeness of two actual people.
The first time transpired back in 2024, when Laurence Sullivan, a man known as the “Florida Joker,” threatened Rockstar with a lawsuit over a character he believed mimicked his viral mugshot from 2017. The character in question did bear some resemblances to Sullivan in that both of them clearly took cues from DC’s Dark Knight, but ultimately Florida Joker did not sue the makers of GTA 6. He did, however, demand millions of dollars in compensation in exchange for the “free marketing” he was providing them. To date, it does not appear that Sullivan was ever paid.
That same trailer, which debuted GTA 6 for the first time, also included a Black character adorned with dreadlocks, a white tank top, and a hefty collection of gold chains. This prompted a response from a TikToker named zoeepoppyy, who posted a video back in 2023 while standing next to a still of the trailer.
“They done cloned Tyrone,” the man said while sucking his teeth in disapproval. “C’mon, can I get paid?” he asked. zoeepoppyy pointed to details like his hair, his chain, his glasses, as well as facial features as evidence for the copycat.
Two years later, Rockstar released a second trailer for GTA 6 — and some things were different. One of these tweaks appears to be the same Black character who triggered the rip-off allegations. This time, however, the NPC is wearing a red hat, a lighter set of shades, a small mustache, and braids. Notably, both characters are wearing a white tank top and the same set of gold chains, the centerpiece of which displays some type of horned animal.
Rockstar did not respond to a request for comment on whether or not this was intended to be the same character, or if the adjustments were made in light of the TikToker’s allegations. But judging from a Twitter post that has been viewed over 13 million times in the span of a few days, fans are convinced that Rockstar changed the character specifically because of the TikToker.
While it’s possible both of these things are related, it’s also worth noting that games in development change all the time, for all sorts of reasons. Jason, one of the protagonists, saw a huge visual upgrade in between trailers for GTA 6. His first iteration leaned more in the generic direction of gruff, buzzcut main character. His latest version, on the other hand, is affixed with a daintier flow of locks that can grow heavy with sweat. You can even spot individual strands of arm hair from afar. Really, the entire trailer is full of impressive changes ranging from the background scenery and weather to minor details like physics and muscle deformation.
That, and, Grand Theft Auto always seems to be ducking some sort of likeness controversy. Infamously, Grand Theft Auto 5 saw Lindsay Lohan sue Rockstar over a character named Lacey Jonas. In that case, the judge ruled that while some similarities were apparent that overall, “indistinct, satirical representations of the style, look, and persona of a modern, beach-going young woman that are not reasonably identifiable as plaintiff.”
