10 Best Games Like Grand Theft Auto 6 (2026)

There is a particular kind of open-world evening that begins with a sensible plan and ends with a helicopter looking for you. The best games like Grand Theft Auto 6 understand at least part of that appeal: a city worth exploring, dangerous work, vehicles worth borrowing and enough freedom to let curiosity get expensive.

Grand Theft Auto VI brings Jason and Lucia to Vice City and the wider state of Leonida, where criminal ambition meets a sun-soaked setting. These picks draw on that setting and crime-story premise, alongside the GTA series’ established appeal. Whether you want another dangerous city to explore or a fresh excuse to borrow someone else’s car, there is a different kind of trouble waiting in each one.

Some lean into criminal storytelling; others give you more tools for making your own trouble. Here are ten worth considering, ranked by how closely they fit that mix of driving, action and open-world freedom.

10. The Precinct

For police pursuits from the other side of the law · PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S · Single-player

There is one small complication if you arrive in The Precinct expecting to steal the nearest car: you are supposed to be the officer preventing that sort of thing. Rookie cop Nick Cordell Jr. patrols Averno City in 1983, dealing with a city whose residents have rather different ideas about acceptable behaviour.

Patrol duties, arrests and pursuits give the open world a clear daily routine. A quiet stretch can turn into a vehicle chase, with destructible obstacles making the route less predictable than a neat line on the map. The elevated camera also recalls the earlier GTA games, although your job comes with rules that a typical Rockstar protagonist would struggle to recognise.

Choose it if urban trouble and reactive pursuits are the attraction. It is a smaller police sandbox, with more attention to procedure than building a criminal career. That difference is the reason to try it: familiar streets become a different kind of playground when you are responsible for restoring order.

Read our review of The Precinct for a closer look at its patrol work and progression.

9. Just Cause 3

For vehicle chaos and spectacularly bad decisions · PC, PS4, Xbox One · Single-player

Sometimes the best plan is to attach something expensive to something explosive and see whether the local government notices. Just Cause 3 sends Rico Rodriguez to the Mediterranean republic of Medici, where dismantling a dictatorship becomes an excuse for an extraordinary amount of property damage.

The grappling hook, parachute and wingsuit make moving around an activity in itself. You can tether objects together, commandeer vehicles and turn military infrastructure into a series of increasingly ambitious experiments. The appeal is often the chain reaction you create rather than the mission marker you were originally following.

This is the pick for anyone who spends more time making trouble in GTA than advancing the story. It trades a believable criminal underworld for an action-film rebellion, so do not come looking for a close equivalent to Jason and Lucia’s relationship. Come for the freedom to improvise, then accept that the bridge may have been important.

8. Mafia: Definitive Edition

For a focused rise through organised crime · PC, PS4, Xbox One · Single-player

Tommy Angelo begins as a taxi driver with a fairly ordinary problem: earning a living. An encounter with the mob introduces a much more dangerous career path. Mafia: Definitive Edition follows that change through the fictional city of Lost Heaven during the 1930s, with loyalty and ambition making increasingly uncomfortable companions.

Driving between jobs, taking part in shootouts and watching criminal relationships develop gives it an obvious connection to GTA. The important distinction is structure. Lost Heaven provides the setting for a largely linear campaign; it is not designed around the same constant invitation to ignore the story and invent your own afternoon.

Pick this when the crime drama is what keeps you playing. Period cars and the setting give the journey a different rhythm from a modern city sandbox. It is a strong evening-by-evening story choice, especially if you would prefer the next meaningful job to arrive before you disappear into another three hours of sightseeing.

7. Cyberpunk 2077

For dangerous city work with room to build your own approach · PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S · Single-player

Night City is the sort of place where a promising career opportunity should probably come with a medical warning. As mercenary V, you take jobs in a sprawling city shaped by corporate power, street gangs and people trying to survive somewhere between the two. There is usually another problem behind the person offering to solve yours.

Vehicles, criminal work and a city full of distractions make the connection easy to see. Cyberpunk adds character builds, cyberware and different ways to approach encounters, with first-person combat and role-playing decisions taking much more space than they do in a conventional GTA recommendation. Your version of V can solve problems very differently from someone else’s.

Choose it for the atmosphere of a dangerous metropolis and the people making a living inside it. The current PC, PS5 and Xbox Series versions are the focus of this recommendation. Expect an action RPG with driving, rather than a one-to-one substitute for Rockstar’s police chases and third-person street-level freedom.

6. Saints Row: The Third Remastered

For an open-world crime spree with its dignity firmly abandoned · PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S · Solo or online co-op

The Third Street Saints have become a brand, which is impressive progress for people whose business model still involves a worrying number of firearms. Their move into Steelport brings them into conflict with the Syndicate, giving your customised boss a new city to conquer and very little reason to behave.

You drive, fight, take on criminal operations and collect increasingly unreasonable tools for causing trouble. Character customisation gives the whole spectacle a personal touch, while co-op lets a friend join the campaign’s questionable decision-making. The remaster updates the presentation of The Third; this is not the separate Saints Row reboot.

It is an easy recommendation if GTA’s sillier diversions tend to swallow your evenings. Saints Row pushes that energy much further, with extravagant weapons and set pieces taking priority over a convincing criminal life. You may miss Rockstar’s restraint in its quieter moments, but restraint was clearly absent from Steelport’s planning meetings.

5. Red Dead Redemption 2

For Rockstar world-building and an outlaw story worth settling into · PC, PS4, Xbox One · Single-player story; separate online mode

A horse is a significant change from a stolen sports car, but Arthur Morgan still has plenty of opportunities to make the authorities unhappy. Red Dead Redemption 2 follows the Van der Linde gang as its outlaw way of life comes under pressure, with the camp providing a home between dangerous jobs.

The connection to GTA runs deeper than the developer’s logo. Story missions sit inside a world that rewards wandering, with strangers, hunting, robberies and ordinary journeys competing for your attention. Spending time with the gang also gives the criminal work a human context: these are people you return to, not merely names attached to the next objective.

Choose it if a richly observed world is what you want from GTA 6. The pace is deliberately slower, and travelling, maintaining equipment and living in the landscape are part of the experience. It is less suitable for a quick blast of modern-city chaos, but an excellent choice when you want the journey between missions to matter.

4. Grand Theft Auto IV

For a darker criminal story and a city with real weight · PC, PS3, Xbox 360 · Single-player; PC Complete Edition has no multiplayer

Niko Bellic arrives in Liberty City hoping for a better life. His cousin Roman has been selling a rather optimistic version of how that life is going. The gap between the promise and the reality gives GTA IV a strong opening, then pulls Niko into work that makes a clean start increasingly difficult.

Liberty City’s traffic, neighbourhoods and crowded streets make driving feel different from cruising through Los Santos. Cars have a heavier character, and the campaign places considerable weight on relationships, old debts and the people who ask Niko for favours. There is still room for absurdity, but the story often lands with a harder edge.

This is the choice for players most interested in a GTA crime drama with consequences. Its older controls and presentation require some adjustment. On PC, the Complete Edition adds The Lost and Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony, but removes the original multiplayer. Choose it for the campaign rather than expecting a current GTA Online alternative.

3. Watch Dogs 2

For a modern city where your phone is part of the getaway plan · PC, PS4, Xbox One · Single-player; optional online activities

Marcus Holloway has a city to explore and a surveillance system to upset. Joining DedSec in the San Francisco Bay Area puts him among hackers whose response to invasive technology involves considerably more activity than changing a privacy setting. There are roads to drive, organisations to infiltrate and plenty of useful devices nearby.

Hacking changes how you read the environment. Cameras can help you scout, gadgets can reach awkward spaces, and connected infrastructure becomes another tool when a situation gets complicated. Driving and on-foot action keep the familiar urban sandbox shape, while remote access gives you reasons to pause before simply charging through the front door.

Try it if the modern setting and freedom to approach a job matter more than playing a conventional gangster. The tone is lighter and its technological tricks make it a distinctive alternative to GTA. A clever plan can be entertaining even when it unravels; having to improvise is often where the city starts earning its keep.

2. Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition

For undercover crime drama and fights that get personal · PC, PS4, Xbox One · Single-player

Wei Shen has a difficult job description: infiltrate Hong Kong’s Triads without losing himself in the process. Sleeping Dogs builds its crime story around that divided loyalty, putting police work and criminal relationships uncomfortably close together. The city gives those tensions somewhere busy, colourful and frequently dangerous to play out.

Driving, races and story missions provide the familiar open-world crime foundation. The biggest change is combat. Hand-to-hand fighting, counters and environmental attacks bring encounters much closer than a typical exchange of gunfire. Guns do appear, but the game has a very clear understanding that a kitchen can be a hazardous workplace.

Start here if you want the strongest alternative outside Rockstar’s catalogue. The undercover premise gives the missions purpose, and the focus on martial arts prevents it from feeling like a simple imitation. The Definitive Edition packages the original game’s additional content with updated presentation. Expect a more compact adventure than a giant modern Rockstar sandbox, with a strong identity of its own.

1. Grand Theft Auto V

For the closest available mix of crime, driving and open-world freedom · PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S · Single-player story; GTA Online is multiplayer

Sometimes the obvious answer earns its place. GTA V remains the clearest starting point when you want a modern Rockstar crime sandbox, following Michael, Franklin and Trevor through a campaign of heists, clashing ambitions and decisions that rarely improve anyone’s stress levels. Los Santos is very good at turning a short drive into a completely different evening.

Switching between the three protagonists gives the story different perspectives, while the wider map leaves room for driving, flying and wandering away from the next job. The balance between directed missions and self-made distractions is the main reason it tops this list. You can chase the next big score or see what happens after taking an entirely unnecessary detour.

Choose the story campaign for a clear introduction, then consider GTA Online if persistent multiplayer is the attraction. They offer different routines, and online purchases and access requirements deserve a separate look. GTA V cannot tell you exactly how GTA 6 will play, but it is the strongest match here for the series’ established combination of criminal storytelling and freedom.

Where will your next wrong turn take you?

GTA V is the most direct choice, Sleeping Dogs is the strongest place to start outside Rockstar, and Watch Dogs 2 gives the modern-city formula a useful technological twist. Choose Red Dead Redemption 2 when you want a world to settle into, or Saints Row when you would rather see how quickly a quiet evening can become an insurance claim.

For more from Rockstar’s crime series, browse our best Grand Theft Auto games and expansions. You can also catch up with our GTA 6 overview as launch approaches.