Dan Houser

Dan Houser and his brother Sam Houser are the sons of British TV and film actress Geraldine Moffat. The brothers started at BMG Interactive, the video game division of the music label BMG, where they scouted DMA Design’s prototype Race’n’Chase, which became Grand Theft Auto.⁠[1]

He has said that in the mid-to-late 1990s he kept planning to leave and do something more serious, because no one took games seriously.⁠[1]

He holds an MA in geography from the University of OxfordUniversity of OxfordThe University of Oxford is a university in Oxford, England, where teaching existed in some form by 1096; it describes itself as the oldest university in the English-speaking world and is organised as a federal system of the university and dozens of self-governing colleges.Open the full entry.⁠[2]

In 1998 he co-founded Rockstar Games with Sam Houser, Terry Donovan, and Jamie King.⁠[3]

Rockstar Games acquired DMA Design, later Rockstar North, in 1999.⁠[4]

He wrote 12 games in the Grand Theft Auto series, from the first game’s expansion Grand Theft Auto: London 1969 through Grand Theft Auto 5, and also wrote Bully, Red Dead Redemption 1 and 2, Max Payne 3, Midnight Club: Los Angeles, and Red Dead Online.⁠[5]

He was a writer on every Red Dead Redemption game and served as executive producer of L.A. Noire.⁠[6]

2001’s Grand Theft Auto III moved the series to 3D, combining a contemporary gangster narrative with a detailed open world, and won AIAS awards including Outstanding Achievement in Game Design.⁠[4]

In 2009 he and Sam Houser were both named to Time magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people.⁠[3]

2013’s Grand Theft Auto V, set in a reimagining of modern-day Southern California, let players switch among three characters in an interwoven story, and generated $1 billion in revenue in three days.⁠[4]

In February 2014 the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences announced the induction of Leslie Benzies, Dan Houser, and Sam Houser into its Hall of Fame, saying Rockstar had blazed a path for the open-world genre.⁠[7]

Before Red Dead Redemption 2’s release, he said in an interview, “we were working 100-hour weeks,” drawing industry criticism over crunch. He then clarified that this referred to three weeks of intense work by the four-person senior writing team, including himself, while wrapping up, adding “we obviously don’t expect anyone else to work this way.”⁠[8]

Rockstar then allowed several employees to describe their experiences on Twitter; most said they had never been asked to work such long hours, while one said he had worked 70-hour weeks during Grand Theft Auto V’s development.⁠[9]

A supporter of the Rainforest Alliance for some fifteen years, he joined its board in 2019.⁠[2]

In February 2020 Take-Two Interactive announced in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing that Dan Houser, Rockstar Games’ Vice President, Creative, who had been on an extended break since spring 2019, would leave the company, with March 11, 2020, as his last day.⁠[10]

The company did not explain the departure and confirmed that Sam Houser would remain; the news sent its share price down 5.5 percent.⁠[11]

On February 17, 2021, he registered Absurd Ventures LLC and Absurd Ventures in Games LLC in the United States; the UK company Absurd Ventures in Games was incorporated on June 23 that year with him as director.⁠[3]

Absurd Ventures began operating with its main office in Santa Monica, California, planning original IP for video games, graphic novels, podcasts, live-action films, animation, and books regardless of medium. “We are building Absurd Ventures to create new universes and to tell great stories,” he said in a press release.⁠[12]

Absurd Ventures announced two original storytelling universes, American Caper and A Better Paradise: the first project of the former was a graphic novel illustrated by Simon Bisley, and of the latter a 12-episode audio fiction series. Rockstar veterans Lazlow Jones and Michael Unsworth had also joined the company.⁠[13]

The A Better Paradise audio series launched in June 2024.⁠[14]

Set in the near future, the series tells of an addictive game-world project led by psychologist Mark Tyburn that goes wrong; it stars Andrew Lincoln and others and was produced with QCODE.⁠[15]

He announced a novel adaptation of A Better Paradise, saying: “Everything I’ve written, whether an interactive or linear story, begins as prose.” A Better Paradise was also being developed as a TV program and an open-world game, while another universe, Absurdaverse, was to launch with animation and an action-comedy adventure game.⁠[16]

Interviewed during LA Comic Con, he said Red Dead Redemption 2 was the best thing he worked on at Rockstar and confirmed he had no involvement in Grand Theft Auto VI: “It's not going to be a story that I wrote.”⁠[17]

His first novel, A Better Paradise Volume One: An Aftermath, was published, with the print edition handled by Simon & Schuster and the ebook by Absurd Ventures Press; set in 2041, it centers on Daisy’s Ark, a game world developed by Tyburn Industria.⁠[18]

He appeared on episode 484 of the Lex FridmanLex FridmanLex Fridman is a Soviet-born, US-raised computer scientist and podcast host who works as an MIT research scientist on human-AI interaction and autonomous driving. His Lex Fridman Podcast is known for hours-long conversations with guests including heads of state and technology leaders.Open the full entry Podcast, discussing topics from GTA 3 to GTA 6, open-world games, the superintelligent AI in A Better Paradise, Red Dead Redemption 2, leaving Rockstar Games, and the future of video games.⁠[19]

He said Absurd Ventures’ next game had been in development for about 18 months and still needed a few more years; the team was “dabbling in using AI,” though much of it was not yet as useful as some companies claimed.⁠[20]

On a radio show he criticized some of those pushing generative AI as “not the most humane or creative people” and argued that AI would “eventually eat itself.”⁠[21]

He expanded Absurd Ventures Press into a full publishing imprint seeking fiction, nonfiction, memoirs, plays, and short stories from outside writers; London-based Midas Group handles commissioning and submissions, with distribution by Simon & Schuster in the U.S. and Turnaround in the U.K.⁠[22]

As of October 2026 he also served on the Board of Trustees of the Brooklyn Museum and on a development committee of The Bowery Mission.⁠[2]

Absurd Ventures: Official website: https://absurdventures.com (opens in a new window)⁠[19]

Rainforest Alliance: Official website: https://www.rainforest-alliance.org/ (opens in a new window)⁠[2]