Europe’s largest exhibition, gamescom 2026, kicks off on August 25 at 8:00 PM Moscow time with a live stream of the Opening Night Live show. The event will be held without the physical presence of Rockstar Games, but organizers don’t see this as a disaster. The Cologne venue will host over 1,600 exhibitors, including CD Projekt Red, Ubisoft, and Nintendo. The absence of the biggest title of recent years shouldn’t dampen audience interest in the hundreds of other announcements.
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Why GTA 6’s absence won’t derail gamescom 2026
The organizers of the Cologne fair are unfazed by the situation. The project’s management is convinced that the industry is too vast to focus on a single release, even the biggest blockbuster of the decade. Audiences are always looking for variety.
Stefan Heichhaus and Tim Enders, the event’s co-leaders, take a pragmatic view:
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The latest GTA 6 trailer will first be shown on Netflix, and a couple of hours later, fresh footage will be released on YouTube.
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Traffic will temporarily shift to Rockstar content, but then gamers will quickly return to the broadcasts from Cologne.
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The full exhibition program includes hundreds of world premieres being prepared by other participants.
Games like Grand Theft Auto act as a “north star” for the entire market, setting overall trends. Enders admits he would be happy to hold a presentation within the show, but the current pace of the industry suggests other scenarios.
Parallel Leaks: Insider Cyberleek Ready to Release a Ninth Leak
While the organizing committee makes final preparations for Opening Night Live, tensions are high in the underground community. A leaker nicknamed Cyberleek claims that the ninth batch of GTA 6 footage will appear online today.
Rockstar’s lawyers and security team continue to hunt for the creator of the videos, but they’re unable to stem the flow of leaked data. The industry is on edge: will this latest leak overshadow the official agenda of Europe’s largest gaming event?
