Major Publishers Say They are Ready to Delay Games to Avoid Grand Theft Auto VI - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 01 April 2025 / 3,547 Views
Three major video game publishers that spoke with The Game Business have stated they are ready to delay their games in order to avoid the launch of Grand Theft Auto VI.
"Rockstar games always suck a lot of money and, more importantly, time out of the market," said the head of one of the world's biggest game publishers. "We don’t want to be anywhere near that. We are working up multiple different plans for our titles."
Another senior executive added, "Even without GTA. it’s immensely difficult to find free time for new games to shine. Time is the real scarcity for us, not money. It’s tough out there."
A boss of a European AAA publisher said the biggest issue is if the game launches in late October or early November.
"We don’t want to launch just before or just after the game," said the publisher. "If it arrives in late October, that means you either have to launch early – which a lot of people seem to be doing with the recent glut of summer release dates. Or go later, putting you up against the Black Friday sales."
Two developers of top 10 live-service games added they don't plan to launch any major updates to their games around the launch window of GTA6.
"GTA 6 is basically a huge meteor and we will just stay clear of the blast zone," said one studio boss. "We will nudge our releases back or forward three weeks to avoid it. Of course, the problem is everyone is going to do the same. So three to four weeks before or after GTA 6, you’re going to get a load of games dropping content in what they believe will be the safe zone."
Another developer added, "There’s no point swimming against the current. We just need to prepare to win players back once the excitement has started to die down."
The companies stated not knowing the exact release date for GTA VI is uplifting their plans.
"If we move out to 2025, what if Rockstar do, too?" said the European boss. "Will we have time to push our game up? Or will we have to delay further? It’s stressful."
Grand Theft Auto VI will launch for the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S in Fall 2025.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Bluesky.
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If GTA 6 and Mario release on the same date, I'm playing Mario for a month before I even consider picking up GTA 6.
Meanwhile Nintendo's the one company most of us think would be willing to risk facing off against GTA6.
GTA 6 holding the video games industry hostage lol. We may end up with a bit of a dry spell.
sounds chickenshit
Absolute cowards
Uh oh. Looks like 2035's gonna be pretty slim.
Yeah, would be kind of suicidal for another AAA game to release in the same month as GTA 6 probably, it's a game that will likely blow all video game launch sales records out of the water, and not many people can afford to buy 2 $70 games in the same month these days.
Not for Nintendo
Yeah, they're probably the sole exception, because 1. they're Nintendo, and 2. GTA 6 won't be day one on Switch 2 much the same as it won't be day one on PC.
Yeah, they will release whatever whenever. Also helps when the game isn't launching on the Switch 2 so those customers won't need to think about it.
I don't care about GTA6, which puts me in the minority there I know, but I would buy any game I'm interested in before GTA6
how long will they delay? once people start playing GTA6 they might play for months or longer
Yeah, makes sense if you have any.
Devolver Digital just tweeted that they are going to release a game on the same day and time as GTA6.
Thats how you do it lads.
Cowards
I think we'll know a release date for GTA 6 several months ahead of time. Everybody will have time to adjust. If I had to make the decision, and I was expecting to release a game anytime between fall 2025 and fall 2026, I would only announce a season, or possibly a month. I would not announce an exact date until after Rockstar says something.
Cool, so they are with going revenue and income for what could be a extended period of time because a rival company is releasing a game? Weird.
GTA will be delayed anyway so better to just release your games now.
This is the more obvious statement in the world...
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