Game Informer's issue 382, revealed on September 25, 2026, puts GTA 6 on its cover with a 14-page story on Leonida, Rockstar's take on Florida. It promises never-before-shared details on three subjects: weather systems that simulate Florida's less sunny weather, wildlife on land, in the air and at sea, and how Rockstar researched Miami and Florida. The digital issue comes out on September 29; here is what is announced, and what Rockstar has already said on each subject.
What is in issue 382
The story is by senior associate editor Marcus Stewart, a lifelong South Florida native, who spoke with several lead designers at Rockstar Games. It promises exclusive quotes and details on "all things Vice City and Leonida", focused on how Rockstar brought its Florida parody to life: in Game Informer's words, just how "Florida" GTA VI aims to be.
Twelve new, exclusive screenshots show more of the game's "sights and citizens". The cover is original artwork supplied by Rockstar, featuring Jason Duval and Lucia Caminos; Push Square describes a stylised image of the pair in a car, with guns.
When and where to read it
The digital edition arrives on Tuesday, September 29. Print copies reach subscribers, then bookstores and newsstands, "in the coming weeks", and Game Informer says the issue will only be available for a limited time. New print subscribers, in the US and in over 50 countries, get it as their first issue.
As of September 28, nothing from the story is online: Game Informer has only published the cover, and Rockstar has not mentioned the issue on its Newswire.
Weather: Florida's less sunny side
According to Game Informer, GTA VI has "advanced weather systems that simulate Florida's less sunny weather phenomena". That is new ground: neither Rockstar's GTA VI site nor the long previews that IGN and the French magazine Trois Couleurs published on August 27, after seeing the game at Rockstar North, mention the weather.
The announcement names no specific phenomenon, such as storms, hurricanes or floods, and does not say whether the weather affects driving, boating or missions.
Wildlife on land, in the air and at sea
Game Informer promises a "staggering amount of wildlife – native and otherwise – roaming Leonida on land, air, and sea". Rockstar's own images already show part of it:
- In Mount Kalaga National Park, a cougar stalks a herd of deer drinking from a stream.
- In the Grassrivers, three mud-covered locals pose on an airboat with a dead alligator and a wildcat.
- In the Leonida Keys, an iguana walks in front of a mobility scooter, and divers swim among coral, fish, an eel and a sea turtle.
- Dolphins swim beside the Squalo, a boat from the Ultimate Edition, and the game's cover art shows a flamingo flying over a speedboat.
Animals are part of the systems, too. According to IGN, which watched Rob Nelson of Rockstar North play the game, you can study animals at the zoo or in the wild, and each new one you find is checked off a list, as in Red Dead Redemption 2. Feeding animals, Nelson told IGN, is another way, like putting litter in a bin, to shift your Criminal Profile, the system that tracks what kind of criminal you are. Rockstar lists hunting among Mount Kalaga's attractions but has not said how it works.
How Rockstar researched Florida
Game Informer ties this research to "the most culturally and aesthetically accurate and lifelike world to date". Rob Nelson, co-studio head of Rockstar North, had already outlined the method to Trois Couleurs: once a setting is chosen, "a handful of people" go there to drive around and "take a ton of pictures", then a larger group returns to meet consultants "who will take us all over the place".
For GTA VI, the team picked what to keep from Florida and Miami: the Everglades, towns outside Miami and Miami itself, placed "roughly in the same geographical locations as they are in the real world", in a "warped sort of version of reality". The writers then shaped the cast around those places, looking for characters believable in the Everglades, in a police raid on a tower block and in glitzy nightclubs, "like your tour guides".
The goal, Nelson says, "is not to be realistic, it's to feel realistic", and the map is "not one-to-one life-size". According to IGN, an epic amount of research also went into styling NPCs so that each area feels distinct, and a Los Angeles team worked solely on their dialogue. Nelson also told Trois Couleurs that the game starts in the Keys, at Jason's house from Trailer 2, before opening up so you can go "anywhere, anytime".
GTA 6 launches on November 19, 2026, on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. The GTA 6 hub counts down the days, and our Leonida map is a community reconstruction, not an official map.
