Trailer 2 spends real time on the islands south of Vice City. Bridges, dive bars, marinas, the road that ends in water - the visual reference is direct and unmistakably the Florida Keys. What it isn't, though, is a 1:1 reproduction.
This piece is a side-by-side: what tracks closely with the real Keys, what is compressed for game pacing, and what looks like Rockstar invention. We use this kind of comparison across the Leonida silo - it tends to give readers a more accurate picture than a literal real-world overlay.
What tracks closely with the real Keys
The geography. A long chain of islands extending south-west from a mainland coastal city, linked by bridges, with the water visibly different shades on either side of the road. That is the Keys. Trailer 2 puts that arrangement on screen with little ambiguity - you can read the Keys analogue inside the first few seconds of the relevant frames.
The vocabulary tracks too. Conch-coded architecture, weathered marinas, light traffic, dive-bar signage, painted buoys, fishing boats moored at the seawall. None of this is invented. All of it is the visual language of the real Keys.
What is almost certainly compressed
The real Florida Keys are 113 miles of bridges and small islands. The chain takes hours to drive end to end. Rockstar will not be reproducing that scale - they don't, ever, and their open worlds are stronger for it. What we are likely seeing is a stylised compression: enough of the chain to feel like the Keys, not so much of it that traversing it becomes tedious.
Compression also applies to the gap between islands. The real Seven Mile Bridge is, accurately, seven miles long. Inside a video game, a seven-mile bridge is an unbroken five-minute drive at speed - the kind of thing Rockstar handles in seconds rather than minutes. Expect the Keys analogue to feel correct rather than measured.
What looks like invention
Some of the islands visible in the trailers do not match a specific real Key. That is fine - Rockstar's worlds always include invented landmarks alongside the real ones, and they tend to do it well. What we should not do is force every island in the trailer onto a real-world map and assume an exact correspondence. The visual reference is the Keys; the specific layout is Rockstar's.
The same goes for any specific named landmark you see called out in community discussion. We track named locations conservatively in the named-locations master list. If a name has not appeared in official material, we hedge.
The bridge route is the headline feature
The drive from Vice City out across the bridges into the Keys analogue is one of the most distinctive single experiences any GTA map has produced - it is going to be one of the things screenshotted, livestreamed and clipped most often. Trailer 2 telegraphs this clearly. We cover the route specifically in the Keys bridge route when that page lands; for now, the broader Florida Keys map page is the working hub.
Bridges are also a Rockstar signature - the original Vice City had bridges that drew the same attention, and GTA 5's Del Perro Pier and Vinewood Hills road network have similar status. The Keys bridge route looks set to become this game's equivalent.
What we don't know yet
Specific island count, specific named islands, whether the chain is fully traversable from launch, and the exact mechanical use of boats and jet-skis around the islands. Trailers show boats and jet-skis - they don't show how they handle, what missions live there, or whether the islands have meaningful side content. This part of the map is one of the more under-discussed in pre-launch coverage and we expect it to surprise people on launch day - in a good way.