"Despite assurances from management"
Who the hell believes management in this kind of situation? They'll be looking to kow-tow to demonstrate their usefulness to the new regime.
What do they care about lying to a bunch of people beneath them that could be fired within the week?
The employees under contract are mostly assets, included in the price of their purchase. Scaring the valuable ones so they think about quitting is going to lower the value of the purchase (provided they wouldn't get severance).
I've been in too many companies that have been purchased to listen to managers telling me how i should feel, verbatim from a memo.
I'm sorry. Propaganda?
Yeah red dead was amazing. But they're making a different game to that at the moment. GTA is usually (in comparison) a bit light on the stories/immersion in favour of goofy stuff and explosions.
Also i don't know about specific evil stuff from rockstar. I just thought they were the usual kind of corpo jerks (union busting etc). Not sure where that particular protest you made is aimed.
Also "successful" is not really about the players. It's great if you're a shareholder though. They do love whoever invented the shark cards.