We got a tour of Ned Lukes gaming setup before GTA 6
If you hop on GTA Online right now, you might run into Ned Luke on the streets of Los Santos. Not just Michael De Santa, the ex-con dad he portrayed in the game, but actual Ned Luke, the actor, in the pixelated flesh as his own player character. Mind your step, by the way: He hasn't quite mastered the Oppressor MK II yet.
It's been more than a decade since Luke, 67, sealed his place in gaming mythology as a Grand Theft Auto V protagonist, and in this era of his career, he's embarked on a side quest of sorts: streaming to an audience of over 3.7 million across TikTok, YouTube, and Twitch. He mainly plays GTA Online, the multiplayer portion of Rockstar Games' bestseller, though he branches out to other popular AAA titles on occasion. His Uncharted 4 playthrough featured his good friend Nolan North, the actor who played Nathan Drake in the Naughty Dog series.
Luke sees streaming as a way to salute and connect with his longtime fans, whom he speaks of with deep gratitude. "I adore my fans, I really do," he told me over a video call last fall. "I appreciate 'em because I believe that the fans are the game. If you don't have the fans, you've got nothing."
For many of them, Luke's broadcasts and stream highlight reels evoke a nostalgic thrill. There's something delightfully meta about seeing the star of your favorite game play that very game. "You made my childhood man, and I love to see that you are still involved in this great journey that Gta 5 has been," wrote one YouTube commenter. "keep it up as always boss[.]"
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Luke doesn't consider himself a lifelong gamer, as he spent most of his youth playing sports and riding horses, though he recalled playing Atari's Pong as a sophomore in high school. He finally caught the gaming bug amid the release of the first PlayStation and Xbox consoles: "I got very into it."
He had played every prior GTA game by the time he landed the role of Michael de Santa in 2013's GTA V, a gig he was dead set on booking as soon as he read the audition material.
PC gaming and streaming are much newer hobbies for Luke. He got his first gaming PC in 2021 after recovering from a life-threatening bout of COVID pneumonia — a "screw you, I'm still alive" sort of thing — and his son planted the idea of streaming in his head. Luke figured he could leverage the sizable social media following that Michael had built him over the years. The only problem: He didn't know how to use any of his gear.
It wasn't until 2023 that Luke decided to get his act together and stream an entire playthrough of GTA V in honor of its tenth anniversary. He wound up buying an entirely new PC from his local Micro Center for the occasion — his first build was already outdated, he said — and he invited two of the store's employees over to show him how it worked.
Those first five streams were "rough," Luke remembered. First he couldn't figure out how to get his full TikTok streams on YouTube. Then his internet started getting unusably laggy. (He wound up running a giant ethernet cable out to his "barn," the shed-studio that houses his streaming setup and DIY voice booth.) But he stuck with it. Eventually, Luke said, "I learned stuff that I never learned before, that I didn't know, and it [streaming] just took off."
Luke likes to joke that his boomer status makes him technically inept, but few boomers I know have such elaborate streaming and gaming setups. He has an advantage in being a brand partner for Asus since late 2024, a gig that has given him extensive access to the company's Republic of Gamers hardware — and enabled a chronic case of upgrade-itis. [Editor's note: Asus is not a sponsor of this story.] Still, Luke is very picky about the products he plugs and plays on.
"I don't attach my name to something that's not good," he said. "Not because I'm like, 'Oh, well, you're so righteous.' ... If somebody buys something on my recommendation, I don't want them going, 'This thing sucks.'"
Here's a rundown of all the PC gaming equipment, streaming gear, and content creation essentials that have managed to earn Luke's five-star seal of approval.
A soon-to-be-upgraded gaming desktop
Luke's current rig features a ROG Crosshair X870E Hero motherboard with an Intel Core i9 CPU, Nvidia's RTX 4090 GPU, 64GB of memory, and four terabytes of storage. He plans to upgrade it before Grand Theft Auto IV comes out this November (barring any more delays). "I would imagine that the gameplay is gonna be off the charts," he said. "I've got to have a 5090 [GPU] for that." He's mulling the idea of building a new PC from scratch on a livestream, Henry Cavill-style.
"I think fans would love to see me build a computer, because I'm a boomer, and I don't know what I'm doing, and I know I'd probably blow it up at least three or four times," he joked.
A beefy PlayStation console
Luke switches from his PC to his PlayStation 5 Pro whenever hackers and modders mess with him in GTA Online. (They're much rarer on console.) It's the only system that's taken up permanent residence in his barn, but he has countless others stashed in a dedicated game room in his house. It's a museum-worthy collection — everything from the original PlayStation to the Nintendo Game Boy and the Xbox 360. One of the only gaming consoles he doesn't currently own is a Wii: "I got rid of the Wii when one of the [controllers] flew through the wall," he said.
Luke doesn't believe in console loyalties ("You can't play Mario Kart on the PS5, right?") but he'll probably always hang onto his PS2. That's what he still uses to play 2001's SSX Tricky, his favorite video game of all time.
A trio of OLED gaming monitors
Luke's setup is fronted by three 240Hz 4K OLED monitors from the esports-tier ROG Swift line. He plays on a 32-inch model in the middle — a "beast," he said — which is flanked by two 27-inch models displaying a suite of livestreaming software.
Luke has his right-side monitor oriented in portrait mode. He puts his Twitch chat on the top half of it ("I need to be able to see stuff big"). Below that, he runs the Camera Hub app for his Elgato webcam ("I just like looking at myself"). The other 27-inch monitor to his left stays in landscape mode. He uses it to pull up OBS Studio, a livestreaming app that he integrates with Restream, a platform that lets him simultaneously broadcast on Twitch, TikTok, and YouTube. He also puts his actual feeds onscreen to make sure they're working.
A responsive pro controller
Luke has a ROG Harpe Ace Extreme gaming mouse and a ROG Azoth Extreme keyboard in his possession, but he prefers playing with a controller. He recently picked up a ROG Raikiri II to use with his PC and Xbox. It has a 1,000Hz polling rate so it's "unbelievably fast," he said.
A lightweight gaming headset
When it comes to headsets, Luke will often use "whatever is laying around" (or whatever he remembers to charge). Sometimes that's a Razer headset, sometimes it's a Turtle Beach headset, but lately, it's usually the ROG Delta II. He just upgraded to it from the ROG Delta S; it has a much longer battery life, a detachable mic, and RGB lighting.
Ever coveting the latest and greatest, Luke plans on adding Asus' new audiophile-oriented ROG Kitharas to his roster soon.
A popular creator mic
Luke said he uses a "crazy" high-end Lauten mic for his voice booth, which was recommended to him by a neighbor's son who works for a major music retailer. But for streaming, he uses one of Logitech's "really good" Blue Yeti mics. His is the standard plug-and-play USB model with four pickup patterns.
A supercharged gaming tablet
Luke doesn't stop gaming when he's traveling, and he counts his ROG Flow Z13 as a must-pack for trips to comic cons and fan expos. (He once pulled an all-nighter in a Lithuanian hotel room playing MLB: The Show on it.) The detachable gaming tablet is "without question" the most beloved gadget he owns, he said. "I take it on the road with me ... and just ball out."
Luke owns the new special-edition Flow Z13 that Asus designed in partnership with Kojima Productions, which has gold accents, a high-end AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 processor, and a hulking 128GB of RAM. It's "an animal," he said. Last year's standard black version is available with the same specs.
Luke has mulled the idea of getting a ROG XG Mobile graphics dock with an RTX 5090 GPU to pair with the Flow Z13, but it's stuck on his wishlist for now. It's partly because he finds the device powerful enough on its own, but it's also because he's running out of room on his desk, he said.
A more compact mobile gaming setup
Luke plays on a ROG Phone 9 Pro during flights and other on-the-go gaming scenarios. He pairs it with an ROG Tessen mobile controller and the ROG AeroActive Cooler X Pro, a cooling accessory with a built-in subwoofer that hooks on the back of the phone. Luke actually owns two AeroActive Cooler X Pros, so he has a spare to stash in his Jeep — that way, he's got one on hand when he goes out on his boat. Yes, Michael finally got his boat back.
The snazzy new ROG Xbox Ally handhelds
Asus and Microsoft's new handheld gaming consoles are two of the newer additions to Luke's arsenal. "They are just monsters," he said. "It really is like having an Xbox in your hands." He finds them more comfortable to use than other handhelds because they have console-style controller grips, "so my boomer hands don’t get tired playing on it."
A drone for shooting unboxing videos
Luke likes to record unboxing videos whenever he gets a new gadget, but "I don't think they're normal unboxings," he said. Others he's watched are basic package-opening clips with bland AI voiceovers, but "I try to make stories when I do them," he explained. He picked up a Snapdragon P40 Lite drone to capture cool overhead shots and outdoor footage.
An iPhone for recording Cameos
Luke is on Cameo, an app that lets users commission videos from celebrities and influencers. He records his on his iPhone 16 Pro.
What makes a good Cameo video? For Luke, it's "one that is not bullshit. ... It's organic." He likes doing his videos off-the-cuff rather than scripting them, and he usually riffs on some of Michael's lines from GTA V, knowing that fans want to see him in character. He encourages birthday celebrants to hit up the Vanilla Unicorn, one of the game's fictional strip clubs, and ends most videos with a plea to "stop firing rockets at my house!"
Luke especially enjoys Cameo requests that ask him to roast someone. "I don't really have much of a filter unless I look at the age [of the recipient]," he said. He only has two rules for making Cameos: no promotions, and no videos for kids younger than 12 or 13.
Discord
Luke runs a Discord server that's open for fans to join. Sometimes, he pops in after livestreams for impromptu Q&As. "It's a very safe place for these guys to go and hang out and make friends," he said, adding that its members hail from around the world. "It's kind of cool that way."
Luke is amazed by GTA V's continuing impact on much of its playerbase. At most of the comic cons he attends, at least one fan gets emotional when they meet, he said. Some have told him he's saved their lives.
"I was like, 'You gave me a little too much credit,'" Luke said. Still, he acknowledges his medium's ability to transport players to places beyond reality, pulling them out of potentially dark places. "That's what video games are, you know?" he said. "It's a place where you can go and escape."