Sometime later this year, Rockstar will release another set of patches for both GTA Online and Red Dead Online. In the former case, the studio claims the update for GTA Online will be its biggest ever and will see the company revisit heists as well as add a new location to the game. Meanwhile, Red Dead Online players can look forward to Rockstar expanding an existing role.   

With just how popular GTA Online continues to be, it’s not surprising to find out Rockstar plans to continue supporting the title. However, Red Dead Online is a different story. Before today’s announcement, Rockstar hadn’t meaningfully updated the game in about seven months, leading some fans to worry the studio had moved on. As Polygon notes, players tried to draw attention to the content drought by dressing up as clowns in-game. Whether the stunt worked is hard to say, but those players will probably appreciate today’s news all the same.

One of the games new PlayStation 5 owners will be able to play after the console launches this holiday season is Grand Theft Auto V. To kick off its PlayStation 5 livestream, Sony announced an enhanced and expanded port of Rockstar’s immensely popular open-world game that will launch in 2021. The company said PlayStation 5 owners will get the game’s online component, GTA Online, for free at launch. What’s more, current PS4 GTA V owners will get $1 million in GTA cash every month until the PlayStation 5 port comes out next year.

The longevity of GTA V is an impressive feat when you consider the game first launched in 2013 on the seventh generation consoles. It hasn’t lost any steam since. The allure of GTA Online has kept thousands of people playing the game to this day.

Rockstar Games will shut down access to Grand Theft Auto Online and Red Dead Online from 2-4 PM ET today “to honor the legacy of George Floyd.” Anti-racism and anti-police brutality protests have taken place across the world after Floyd died on May 25th. Four former Minneapolis police officers have been charged in connection with Floyd’s death.

Following the memorial, we hope you will join us in further honoring the many victims of America’s racial injustices by supporting their families, black-owned businesses, those marching on the streets, and coalitions through the organizations listed here: https://t.co/yIQu2R1pJb

— Rockstar Games (@RockstarGames) June 4, 2020

The publisher expressed support for the Black Lives Matter movement in its announcement. It also encouraged players to “honor the many victims of America’s racial injustices by supporting their families, black-owned businesses, those marching on the streets and coalitions” through a number of civil rights organizations and charities.

Rockstar’s multiplayer games apparently had a banner holiday, and the company is using that as an excuse to hand out goodies to players (and, conveniently, give them a reason to keep playing). GTA Online gamers will get $1 million in virtual currency if they play before February 5th, and can receive another $1 million more if they sign on between February 6th and February 12th. Red Dead Online players, meanwhile, can pick up a “Gunslinger’s Cache” with guns and ammo by February 3rd, or a “Bounty Hunter’s Kit” (with a license and gear) between February 4th and February 10th.

The timing might have been ideal. While there wasn’t a huge GTA Online update in the spring, Red Dead Online exited beta in May with a large update that included more activities and, of course, more gear to buy. The current quarter looks bright, too, with Rockstar recently introducing an honest-to-goodness casino to GTA Online — it doesn’t involve betting real money, but it certainly helps encourage other purchases with real-world cash.

Whether or not that momentum persists is another matter. GTA Online is almost six years old at this point, and it’s too soon to say if Red Dead Online will have the legs of its predecessor. There’s also the not-so-small matter of next-gen consoles on the horizon. With the PS5 and Project Scarlett Xbox expected to arrive in late 2020, there’s a risk that Rockstar’s games will feel slightly dated even if they see some improvements from the new hardware. Still, not many people would have predicted that GTA Online would perform so well throughout the current console generation. Even if demand drops, it’ll represent a major success.