It's still months before we can even hope to have GTA 6 in our hands, but there's no doubt that it's one of, if not the most anticipated game on the horizon. However, its launch doesn't just have a lot riding on it because of its eager fanbase, as one games industry analyst predicts that "there's probably never been a more important thing to ever release in the industry."
This prediction comes from Circana's Mat Piscatella, who spoke about his expectations surrounding the amount that will be spent on video games by consumers this year and beyond in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz. He believes that 2024 is going to be a "tough" and potentially slightly "painful" year, pointing to uncertainty regarding this year's lineup of games. However, he's a lot more optimistic about 2025, which we already know has a tasty selection of heavy hitters including Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, Pokemon Legends: Z-A, and, of course, GTA 6.
"If you look towards 2025, if interest rates come down and money becomes a little bit more free-flowing to devs and pubs, we should get a boost in the development cycle again," Piscatella explains. "We're going to get a renewed batch of interest with GTA 6 in particular. There's probably never been a more important thing to ever release in the industry, so no pressure."
- GTA 6 is "definitely gonna be a big economic boost for the games industry" that'll help "bring a lot more people back into the ecosystem," says Day of the Devs' lead curator
- GTA 6 will double GTA 5 and make $3.2 billion in its first year, analysts say – "The pent-up demand is greater than anything we’ve seen before”
This isn't the first time that Piscatella has placed so much importance on GTA 6 when it comes to its impact on the video game market. Last month, he said that amongst the common aim for game developers and publishers alike to "survive 2024," he believes that the "market's gotta get to GTA 6 and hope."
That's not to say that there's nothing exciting releasing in 2024, however. We've already seen some pretty huge hits in the form of Helldivers 2, Persona 3 Reload, and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. Still to come, we've got Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Star Wars Outlaws, and Dragon's Dogma 2, just to name a few.
At the time of writing, it's still not been confirmed exactly when in 2025 we can expect GTA 6 to launch – we've still only seen one trailer for it, after all. Considering how many views that trailer managed to rack up in such a short amount of time though, there's little doubt that it's going to be huge, so let's just hope that it can meet expectations.
Take a look at our handy roundup of new games launching in 2024 and beyond to see what's around the corner.
