Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick has spoken about the planned Fall 2025 release window for Grand Theft Auto 6 and how the publisher is going to handle its release. In a recent earnings call, Zelnick spoke about how, despite the potential success of GTA 6, the studio can’t afford to get arrogant about it.
During the Q&A session of the call, Zelnick spoke about how, rather than being arrogant about GTA 6 being a massive upcoming release, Take-Two is instead cautious, and even scared of what competition in the wider gaming industry will be doing.
“We believe that arrogance is the enemy of continued success,” Zelnick said in the Q&A session of the Take-Two Interactive earnings call. “We run scared. We’re looking over our shoulder. Our competitors are not asleep. So what do we do about that? We try to be the most creative, the most innovative, and the most efficient company in the entertainment industry. And Rockstar Games, in particular, seeks perfection in everything they do. And we believe that if we do that right and focus on delivering for consumers, that’s our best opportunity to succeed.”
This follows Zelnick’s earlier statements from the earnings call talking about how GTA 6 is still on track for release in Fall 2025. In another interview, however, he did mention that while development may be currently going according to schedule, slippages can happen. Zelnick also similarly spoke about being aware that competition from the industry wouldn’t be asleep.
Answering a question about how GTA 6 might manage to engage multiple generations of players, Zelnick also spoke about understanding how to market GTA 6 to the ideal audience. Mentioning having an “extraordinary corporate consumer database” with more than 1 million records, Zelnick spoke about being mindful of who is already engaged with the GTA franchise, and how new players can be brought to the upcoming title.
“We’re mindful of those who we believe will be interested in the title going forward, and we can tailor our marketing accordingly,” said Zelnick. “But we genuinely don’t spend a lot of time thinking about ‘Well, is this going to be x number of units or y number of units’ because that doesn’t change anything we can do. We focus on what we can affect, and we let the outcomes take care of themselves. And I’m sorry, I said one million consumer records. I meant one billion. I was only off by three digits.”
Industry analysts have also been talking about the potential success of GTA 6 and how its release has the potential to change the industry as a whole. Epyllion analyst Matthew Ball, for instance, believes that it could be one of the first titles to be priced at $100 for its base edition. Other analysts, however, believe that this is unlikely and that Take-Two and Rockstar would have more to lose than gain by charging such a high price, and thus raising the barrier of entry for new players.
Grand Theft Auto 6 is currently in development for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.
