Last Updated on Jun 15, 2026 @ 23:24:53 PM.
If you’re into video games, chances are, you’ll have played something that industry legend Dan Houser has touched. Co-founder of Rockstar Games, former Lead Writer and Creative Director for the biggest gaming franchise in the world, Grand Theft Auto, it’s safe to say he knows a thing or two, not only about game development, but story telling.
Since leaving Rockstar Games in 2020, and founding Absurd Ventures in 2021, he’s been mixing things up in the creative world, across all sort of mediums, from television to film, comics to books, and at the Tribeca Festival, alongside co-founder Lazlow, he opened up on his process, in a variety of ways.
When asked about how he manages to balance topical satire, something incredibly prevalent in the GTA franchise, with timeless storytelling, he said:
“Some jokes don’t age that well — society changes values… In terms of jokes, you find things that you think are funny that have some kind of eternal truth about human foibles in them, and then most of them should stand on the test of time. Politicians are always going to be hypocritical. They may not always be comparable in this way or that way – but if what you’re exposing is the hypocrisy, that’s probably going to last. I think it’s always about looking for something that feels both topical in some ways but has some eternal truth.”
Hard to argue with that, especially with how inflammatory the world is right now. He didn’t stop there though, as he went on to comment on how his process begins with ideas:
“It always comes down to story or narrative… What we’re looking for is something we find interesting and then a conflict. A character who is not at one with his world, and then that evolves into something bigger. Then we’d bat it backwards and forwards, and some things would blossom and some things would shrivel. But you start to go, “I think this has legs.”
He was also asked how he thinks players experience open world games, obviously with the aforementioned franchise in mind, but not limited to it. His response is perhaps more in depth than you’d expect, but incredibly insightful to have much thought goes into delivering an engaging and meaningful open-world experience for gamers:
“The whole point of an open world game is we provide guides, but we want you to experience the story…The players enjoying being in the world, mucking around, doing whatever they want to do, messing with the systems. The most fun thing about the game isn’t any rubbish we write, it’s the systems that we make. That’s still always going to be the most fun – it’s being in this world, seeing what happens when you jump off this building, when you punch that person, you drive that car, when you interact with this thing or that thing, whatever way, that’s always going to have a sort of magical quality to it — and we are on some level on the story side, just the icing on the cake. We can’t be precious about what they do. We can encourage them to play it the way we want them to play it, but we have to give them agency.”
Absurd Ventures continues to expand its catalogue across a range of mediums as we speak, and is currently developing an unknown video game project, but as soon as we know more, we’ll be sure to let you know. If nothing else, these insights to Houser’s mind goes a long way to explaining why everything he’s worked on has gone on to be both incredibly successful and ended up as part of pop culture history.
For more from us, check out Enginefall’s demo details, or why Warhammer might have some competition in Miniature Painter Simulator.
Luke Addison is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Thumb Wars. Having previously been a part of multiple outlets over the years, including building an entire gaming team from nothing to something, he thought it best to forge his own path and answer only to himself. As likely to be found playing the latest game as he is in the kitchen relaxing (by cooking), he always brings the same bold and brash attitude to everything he does, with a heavy leaning on sarcasm and dry wit!
