Picture this. You’re playing GTA Online in a public lobby, doing your personal crimes and heists while other players go about their business. Suddenly, the screen goes black, and when it comes back up you’re in front of a home or garage entrance along with every other player in the lobby. Everybody is surprised, angry, and armed.
That’s what’s been happening to an increasing number of PS4 and Xbox One players since Rockstar pushed a small GTA Online background update live yesterday. One minute you’re minding your own crime business, the next you’re in a fight for your life against everybody present. YouTuber GeriatricGTA posted a video of the glitch in action earlier today. It starts with them walking in a circle in the middle of a street, as one does, and ends with them so very dead.
Being randomly teleported is old hat to PC GTA Online players due to all the modders on that platform, but it’s something new and novel for the Xbox One and PS4 crowd. While many Redditors discussing the glitch are suggesting that somehow the modders have finally figured out how to be annoying on console as well, popular GTA Online data miner Tez2 has a much less sinister, slightly more stupid explanation. According to Tez2, Rockstar pushed a background update live yesterday that for some reason swaps a specific event with a call to teleport to a garage or apartment.
Basically, someone in the game does a thing, and that thing causes everyone to be whisked away to that outside of that person’s home base. It’s not a malicious act, just a weird occurrence that I’m almost certain no one will exploit before Rockstar gets around to fixing it.
Until then, either be boring and avoid public lobbies altogether or be daring and roll the dice. Who knows, your internet might be fast enough that you get to shoot first. Wouldn’t that be something?