On Sunday, September 18, Rockstar Games was hit by a massive cyber attack. Parts of the footage and source code for its in-development GTA VI were leaked.
The videos quickly went viral in gaming communities around the world, and the topic inevitably turned into a discussion about the quality of the game graphics.
On September 19, one Twitter user commented on one of the GTA VI leaks complaining about how the graphics look bad, saying, “visuals are one of the first things done.”
The comment quickly got a lot of likes and led to a heated discussion. On September 20, game journalist Cian Maher posted an early 3D model of Horizon: Zero Dawn refuting the idea that visuals are the first thing done in a video game.
"Graphics are the first thing finished in a video game"
— Cian Maher (@cianmaher0) September 20, 2022
Here's a Thunderjaw from an early build of Horizon: Zero Dawn pic.twitter.com/Xq6fw5fS0e
The tweet immediately got over 56,000 likes and 4,600 retweets and started to spread across Twitter as more and more game devs shared the early graphics of the games they developed.
Since graphics are the first thing finished in a video game, and CONTROL won multiple awards for excellence in graphics, here is footage from the beginning of development :)
— Paul Ehreth 🔻 (@bacon_sanwich) September 20, 2022
Full video here: https://t.co/l2g7oPhtk7
🔻 pic.twitter.com/cGnmJZXF5E
"Graphics are the first thing finished in a video game"
— Cult of the Lamb 🙏🐑👑 (@cultofthelamb) September 20, 2022
Here's what early versions of Cult of the Lamb looked like pic.twitter.com/F5EyEH6M9r
The recent popular game Cult of the Lamb also joins the trend, as well as Control, which won multiple awards for its excellent graphics.
As of now, there are more than 12 game devs and journalists who have shown early production footage to support Rockstar in the leak incident, including Destiny, A Plague Tale: Requiem, IMMORTALITY and Sea of Thieves.
The Twitter user who initially made the comment has not responded except to change his account to private, but he will surely be remembered as a meme for a while.