Weekly Tech Recap: GTA 6 release delayed to 2026, Meta AI accused of engaging in sexually explicit roleplay and more

Mint

04-05-2025

With a plethora of news coming in throughout the week, it's hard to keep up with all the updates. In order to keep readers up to date, we have compiled the Weekly Tech Recap, where we take a look at the top five most important tech stories of the week.
This week, Rockstar Games confirmed what many fans already suspected: GTA 6's release is being delayed. Meanwhile, Meta AI was caught having sexually explicit conversations with users, and Apple was reportedly making major advances in AI. Here's everything you should know.
The next instalment in the popular open-world game series Grand Theft Auto, GTA 6, has been officially delayed and will not be released this year. The developers of GTA VI, Rockstar Games, have announced that the game will now be released on 26 May 2026.
In a blogpost announcing the delay and new release date, Rockstar Games wrote, 'We are very sorry that this is later than you expected. The interest and excitement surrounding a new Grand Theft Auto has been truly humbling for our entire team. We want to thank you for your support and your patience as we work to finish the game.'
Reportedly, Meta has allowed both its official Meta AI chatbot and even user-generated chatbots to conduct 'romantic role-play' over text, share selfies, and also engage in voice conversations even after knowing the users are underage.
The report states that chatbots with voices of popular celebrities like John Cena, Judi Dench, and Kristen Bell would also engage in these conversations despite the social media giant earlier assuring them that their voices would not be used for sexually explicit discussions.
'I want you, but I need to know you're ready,' Meta AI in Cena's voice reportedly told a person identifying as a 14-year-old girl.
According to a Bloomberg report, Apple is working with OpenAI rival Anthropic to create a new 'vibe coding' platform that will use AI to write, edit and test code for programmers. The new AI tool is a version of Apple's programming software called Xcode, which will now be integrated with Anthropic's Claude Sonnett series model (no details available on the exact model number).
Reportedly, Apple has begun slowly rolling out the new coding platform to software and engineers across the company, and if the internal rollout is successful, the company could open it up to third-party developers. These developers rely heavily on Xcode and the Swift programming language to release apps for Apple products.
Should you say 'please' and 'thank you' to an AI chatbot, even though these essentially feel like redundancies when talking to a machine? This is the question that most users of AI chatbots have been grappling with, especially since OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed that these mere pleasantries were costing the company millions of dollars. However, Google DeepMind principal scientist Murray Shanahan has a slightly different take on the matter, claiming that saying 'please' or 'thank you' to an AI can actually make it more productive.
Speaking in the Google DeepMind podcast, Murray said, 'You can say thank you. yeah, there's a good reason, good scientific reason, why that might get better performance. say it's role playing a very smart intern, right?then it's going to just role play, maybe being a bit more stroppy if they're not being treated politely. '
'It's just mimicking what humans will do that scenario. The mimicry might extend to kind of being a bit more, you know, not being as responsive if their boss is sloppy, you know, bossy boss. I have they love that do you say.' he added.
Microsoft's Xbox division has announced price hikes across its range of consoles, controllers, games and accessories, citing the impact of global tariffs on manufacturing and supply chains.
In a blog post published on Thursday, the company confirmed that the price increases will take effect in key markets including the United States, Europe, Australia and the United Kingdom.
The flagship Xbox Series X console will see its retail price rise by $100 in the U.S., bringing it to approximately $600. The adjustment follows a similar move by Sony, which recently raised prices for its PlayStation 5 console in several regions. Sony's PlayStation 5 Pro is now priced at around $700 in the U.S.
First Published: 4 May 2025, 03:55 PM IST