How do you solve a problem like GTA 6?
What I mean by that is that when you have a game like GTA 6 it sort of dominates the store shelves – it dominates the topic of conversation. And getting back to the store shelves that’s the problem. When you release a game like this, anything released a few weeks ahead of time and then a few weeks to a few months afterwards is sort of in the dark. So what do you do with your game?
If you’re in Indie, a small developer, then you’ll be fine, no problem there. But if you’re a bigger company releasing another Triple A game you’ve got to steer clear of the behemoth that is GTA 6. So either 2026 is going to have a stacked opening year and a stacked closing year or people are not going to care and they’re just going to release their games when they release them. But I don’t think the big guys want to do that. They want to steer clear of GTA 6 because they know they can’t compete. We’ve seen it before on smaller scales. For example The Horizon sequel was released I think late February had about a week on the store shelves and then Elden Ring released and nobody talked about Horizon afterwards.
Now some are worried that maybe that date won’t hold in May of next year for GTA 6 release but I feel like they’re pretty good about setting a date and keeping it and that’s fine. You can worry about if a game is going to make its release date or if it’s going to be pushed back – it’s likely not going to get pushed up. So you roll your dice. You release in February/March maybe early April at the latest but then where do you go after it releases. And what happens if it has the online component ready to go out of the gate?
Not to make predictions, I’m not very good at those, but I would have to say that we’re going to have a very stacked February and March of 2026, a dead summer, and then we’ll see releases start to pick up as usual late August early September on into the holidays. Maybe.
But back to my question at the beginning. The answer is, you don’t. You just get out of its way.
If I had a choice between buying GTA 6 or a new Splinter Cell game, well, I’d buy GTA 6 cause there is no new Splinter Cell game. Ubisoft, it has been 4,290 days since a new Splinter Cell game (non-animated series or guest spot in another game franchise, remake, BBC radio drama, or VR exclusive) was released.
Also, there’s been 2,140 job losses in the gaming industry since January 1, 2025.
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