Rockstar Presents Evidence in Ongoing Union Court Case

Following a preliminary hearing at the UK Employment Tribunal, details have emerged about the evidence submitted by Rockstar to justify the termination of 34 employees due to severe misconduct. The hearing resulted in the Glasgow Employment Tribunal denying a request for interim relief. The evidence in question involves 'confidential information' that was allegedly shared on a Discord server created by the Independent Workers' Union of Great Britain. According to a report by People Make Games, Rockstar's lawyer, Andrew Burns, requested that certain messages related to this information not be read aloud in court. However, since Rockstar did not request reporting restrictions on the submission of evidence, it was possible to arrange a viewing of the evidence with the court. The 'highly sensitive' evidence referenced a conversation between two former employees about requesting time off, with one worker mentioning a new policy limiting the number of people who could be off at the same time. Another employee criticized this policy, pointing out that managing a 32-player session should be feasible and allow for time off. People Make Games noted that Rockstar was deeply concerned about the discovery that some claimants had shared highly confidential and commercially sensitive information regarding an unannounced live service, including the planned number of online players. This information has not been publicly disclosed by Rockstar. The company's evidence also included a Discord message from an employee who was fired, in which they discussed the absence of crunch time in Rockstar North's QA department. The message stated, 'Nothing I've heard in North QA! Will keep you updated if anything changes.' Jennifer Kolbe, Rockstar's head of publishing, stated in her witness statement that this message included information about working patterns in the team that could indicate the stage of development of Grand Theft Auto 6 and potentially undermine team collaboration. The submitted evidence also revealed that the journalist Rockstar claimed was 'lurking' on the server was Scott Alsworth, a game writer and narrative designer who worked at Bohemia Interactive for over a decade and founded the co-development studio Cerberus Creative. As an elected representative of the IWGB's Game Workers branch, Alsworth was invited to the Discord server. Between 2022 and 2025, Alsworth wrote six articles for The Morning Star, including an opinion piece on Grand Theft Auto following the delay of GTA 6. Rockstar argued that due to his reporting, Alsworth's involvement in the union Discord server posed a 'legitimate risk' to the company.