Rockstar Games Finally Releases New Game, It’s Just A $70 Loading Screen With Microtransactions
NEW YORK – In a move that has simultaneously shocked absolutely no one and yet still managed to disappoint the entire planet, Rockstar Games announced the release of their next major title this morning. Titled “Grand Theft Auto: Loading Screen Simulator,” the game promises to deliver the “authentic, immersive experience of waiting for a game to start, but with more ways to empty your wallet.”
Industry insiders are already calling it “the most Rockstar thing they’ve ever done.”
For the uninitiated, Rockstar Games is the studio that brought you those childhood memories of stealing cars and running over hookers to get your health back. They’re also the studio that, after the massive success of Grand Theft Auto V, decided to abandon any pretense of making actual games and instead turned their entire company into a digital slot machine disguised as a western. Remember Red Dead Redemption 2? Yeah, that was five years ago. Since then, they’ve been busy milking GTA Online for every last penny, adding things like flying motorcycles that shoot rockets and a casino that’s definitely not gambling because you’re using fake money that you can buy with real money. It’s fine. It’s totally fine.
But this? This is a new low. Even for them.
The game, which costs a cool $69.99 on launch day (because of course it does), is literally just a screen that says “LOADING…” with a tiny spinning donut in the corner. For that price, you’d expect at least a high-definition picture of a donut. Nope. It’s a low-res, pixelated mess that looks like it was ripped straight from a 1995 PC boot screen. But here’s the kicker: you can pay real money to make the donut spin faster. $4.99 for “The Express Donut.” $9.99 for “The Turbo Donut.” $19.99 for “The Donut That’s So Fast It Might Actually Just Be a Blur of Color That Hurts Your Eyes.” And for the low, low price of $49.99, you can unlock “The Platinum Donut,” which is the same exact donut but it’s gold. Because of course it is.
“We wanted to capture the essence of what makes Rockstar games so great,” said a company spokesperson in a press release that read like a parody of corporate greed. “The anticipation. The slow burn. The feeling that you’re about to have fun, but not quite yet. We’ve distilled that into a pure, unadulterated experience. And if you want to skip that experience, you can pay us.”
The article goes on to describe a “beta test” where players reported staring at the loading screen for an average of 47 minutes before realizing there was no actual game. Some users claimed they accidentally left it on overnight and woke up to a message saying their character had been “idled for too long” and was now in a coma. The game then prompted them to pay $14.99 for “Coma Recovery Insurance.” It’s unclear if this is a joke. It is not a joke.
Reddit, predictably, is in full meltdown mode. The r/gaming subreddit has essentially become a war crime tribunal, with users posting screenshots of their loading screens and asking if anyone else has “unlocked the secret level where you actually play a game.” The top post right now is a 10-hour video of someone’s loading screen with a caption that reads, “Finally beat the final boss. It was a loading screen. 10/10 would get scammed again.”
One user, u/Not_An_Idiot_I_Swear, wrote a detailed analysis of the game’s monetization model, concluding that if you paid for every possible microtransaction, you would spend approximately $1,247.89 to fully “unlock” a loading screen that still doesn’t load anything. “It’s like buying a yacht but the yacht is just a piece of paper that says ‘yacht’ and you’re not allowed to touch water,” they wrote. The comment has 47,000 upvotes and 12 platinum awards, which is ironic because those awards cost real money and do nothing.
But here’s where it gets really wild. The article also reveals that the game has a “battle pass” that costs $19.99 per season. What do you get in the battle pass? Different colors for the loading bar. Season 1 is “Red Bar.” Season 2 is “Blue Bar.” Season 3 is “Bar That’s Actually Just a Slightly Different Shade of Red, But We’re Calling It Crimson Because It Sounds Cooler.” Players are already complaining that the “Crimson Bar” is barely distinguishable from the free “Red Bar,” but Rockstar has yet to comment. Probably because they’re too busy counting money.
The article also mentions that the game has a “premium currency” called “Rock Bucks,” which you can buy with real money and use to purchase “exclusive loading screen art.” So far, the only available art is a picture of a cowboy holding a bag of money. The cowboy’s face is obscured by a shadow. The bag of money is in full, glorious 4K resolution. “We wanted to pay homage to our roots,” the spokesperson said. “Red Dead Redemption was a masterpiece. This is a masterpiece of capitalism.”
And in a final twist that feels like it was ripped straight from a Black Mirror episode, the game also features a “NFT-integrated loading screen” where you can mint your specific loading screen as a one-of-a-kind digital asset. So far, exactly three people have bought one. Two of them are bots. The third is a tech bro who unironically uses the phrase “the future of gaming.” He has been ratioed into oblivion on Twitter.
So, what’s next for Rockstar? According to the article, they’re already working on a sequel: “Grand Theft Auto: Loading Screen Simulator 2 – The Loading Screen Simulator.” It will feature
Final Thoughts
After decades of watching Rockstar teeter between visionary ambition and corporate caution, it’s clear the studio’s true legacy isn’t just the worlds it builds, but the uncomfortable silence it leaves between releases—a calculated scarcity that makes every Grand Theft Auto feel like a cultural event rather than just a product. Their obsessive, often punishing development cycle has birthed masterpieces of satire and systemic design, yet it also risks calcifying a once-rebellious studio into a monument to its own past. In the end, Rockstar’s greatest trick isn’t convincing us to play their games, but to spend years waiting for the next one—and calling it devotion.