With Grand Theft Auto VI landing November 19, playstation.blog reports that pre-loading on PS5 began today — nine days early — after Sony joined with Rockstar Games to let players stage the game ahead of launch.

Sony calls it a response to unprecedented demand, saying GTA VI is now the most pre-ordered game in the history of PlayStation Store.

A rolling midnight launch by country begins at 12:00AM NZDT in New Zealand, and players with code-in-box copies can activate their codes to pre-load as soon as they receive them.

CNET reports that Rockstar Games revealed Grand Theft Auto VI weighs in at 212 GB — enough, by CNET's own account, to take up roughly half of an Xbox Series S's storage.

CNET's Zachary McAuliffe says he plans to download the game despite the cloud option, warning that streaming may affect performance and depends heavily on a strong internet connection. With only days until release, the sheer install size is the surprise headline behind the launch hype.

It arrives alongside Xbox's parallel message: Xbox Wire says the game is available now to pre-install on Xbox Series X and Series S, calling GTA VI the most pre-ordered title of all time on the Microsoft Store.

Both platform holders are pushing the same advice — begin pre-loading as soon as possible to be ready for launch day.

According to CNET, uninstalling files is the simplest and cheapest way to make room — and deleting games does not cost players their save files, trophies or achievements. CNET notes that removing a game like Call of Duty alone could free up nearly 315 GB, more than enough space for GTA VI.

It adds that Rockstar North's Rob Nelson told The New York Times he had an 80-hour playthrough in February, so players can expect to stay immersed in Leonida without juggling many other titles.

CNET lays out the alternatives: internal expansion (Seagate or SanDisk cards on Xbox, M.2 SSDs on PS5 — with CNET's David Carnoy recommending the Lexar NM 790) lets players hop seamlessly between GTA VI and other games, while external HDDs have caveats.

On Xbox, Series X/S-optimized games can only be stored on an external HDD and must be moved back to internal storage to play; the PS5 similarly only stores PS5 games on external drives.

Game Pass Ultimate's top tier provides 15 hours of monthly cloud gaming per CNET, and GTA VI streaming is capped at Series S graphical settings per Xbox Wire.

Launch day brings rolling midnight unlocks across countries on PlayStation, with Xbox cloud streaming beginning at 1am ET, per Xbox Wire, which adds that Grand Theft Auto V, Red Dead Redemption 2 and more Rockstar titles will join Xbox Cloud Gaming in coming months.

Pre-orders on the Microsoft Store include the Vintage Vice City Pack and a month of GTA+, and PlayStation players get DualSense haptics, adaptive triggers, Tempest 3D Audio and PS5 Pro's PSSR and ray-traced shadows per playstation.blog.

The clock is now the story: pre-load, or risk not playing at launch.