About

What I Looked Like When GTA V Came Out vs. Now is a comparison format that involves a user posting a photograph of themselves from 2013, when the action-adventure video game Grand Theft Auto V was released, and a photograph of themselves in November 2023, when Rockstar Games announced the premiere date for the Grand Theft Auto VI trailer alongside the catchphrase "what I looked like when GTA V came out vs now."

Origin

On November 8th, 2023, video game publisher Rockstar Games announced the December premiere of the first trailer for Grand Theft Auto VI.^[1]

Later that day, X user @JordanMiddler posted two photographs of himself, one made in 2013 when Grand Theft Auto V, the previous installment of the game, was released, and one made in November 2023. The post, captioned "What I looked like when GTA V came out vs now," received over 210 reposts and 600 likes in one day (shown below).^[2]

Spread

Starting on November 8th, 2023, multiple users on X made similar posts, posting photographs of themselves from 2013 and now. For example, video game journalist @lucyjamesgames^[3] posted two photographs of herself that received over 310 reposts and 2,700 likes in one day (shown below, left). Voice actor @The_Ben_Sstarr^[4] posted two images that received over 410 reposts and 6,500 likes in one day (shown below, right).

The trend developed into a meme format as users made joking posts that exaggerated the aging or used images of popular characters. For example, on November 8th, X^[5] user @DavidBHayter posted two images of Snake from Metal Gear Solid video game series that received over 1,900 reposts and 17,000 likes in one day (shown below, left).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References