New GTA 4 beta leak is a bombshell for hardcore fans

Grand Theft Auto fans are currently dissecting countless files in the hopes of finding cut content

With a booming retro game scene, actually finding a hidden gem at a garage sale or flea market has become all but a fantasy. One gamer in Scotland, however, has seemingly hit the Mt. Chiliad mother lode. The person claims that they bought an Xbox 360 at a flea market in Edinburgh for £5, only to find it included an unfinished version of Grand Theft Auto 4.

The story stems from the GTA Forums, where a user named janmatant dumped a repository of thousands of files that appear to contain a wide variety of unfinished GTA 4 assets. "Found it at a car boot sale for a fiver," janmatant said, with a smiley emoji. To prove its legitimacy, the fan uploaded pictures of a scuffed-up console with a Rockstar North label on it. Beyond the sheer number of media files, another thing that makes the dev kit appear legit is that a former Rockstar employee confirmed on social media that one of the assets shared online were indeed cut from the game.

Fans are still going through the enormous amount of data, but what's been found so far will be fascinating to anyone who has played the seminal open-world game. The unfinished build has a collection of songs that hint toward a much different radio ecosystem. You can see the in-progress list here, but some highlights include tunes by Run DMC, Daddy Yankee, and the band Goose. There are also models that suggest a possible zombie mode.

Most of what players are finding are smaller details, like alternate models for cars, NPCs, and guns. For example, there are a couple of (NSFW) renders of an early version of the stripper models in the haul, as well as a few morbid renditions of murdered policemen. There are earlier versions of several cutscenes included among the files as well. But my favorite discovery from all of this isn't the leak itself, however fascinating it may be from a preservation standpoint. It's reading what disappointed superfans wanted to find in the files.

"No fat female cop in this build?" one hopeful fan asked, in reference to a character that was visible in one of GTA 4's pre-release trailers. Another user, who bemoans that the models in this 2007 build of the game are closer to finished than not, was sad to discover the hoard of files did not contain an ice cream van.

I'm also having fun looking at highly specific things folks are zooming in on. Some folks on the GTA forums know the game inside and out, so they can tell, for instance, that the textures on some characters' pants are slightly different in the beta. This post, containing a collection of early phone models, has been marked by GTA Forums as a popular item in a thread full of hundreds of replies and highlights. A surprising number of people are trying to figure out if this leak might explain why a texture in a pre-release screenshot appeared to be shinier than what actually shipped in the game.

So far, the aspect most people seem excited about is finally being able to see the GTA 4 ferry. The boat, which appeared in the first trailer for the game, had become a fixation for fans who kept unearthing evidence that a transportation mechanic had been cut from the game. In 2024, a former Rockstar employee explained that ferries caused issues with the in-engine physics.

"Seeing the ferry is something so unreal," one GTA Forums user wrote.

The lucky flea market shopper janmatant says they are hoping to sell the console. For now, fans are speculating where the console actually came from. One of the files on the Xbox is called "Les_Home," so now folks are convinced this hardware belonged to the now infamous ex-Rockstar producer, Leslie Benzies.

"Just crazy this devkit was sitting around somewhere for nearly 20 years," another GTA fan wrote.