GTA 6's biggest competitor is GTA 5, not other new games, analyst says

Grand Theft Auto 6 will only have one real competitor when it launches in May 2026: Its predecessor.

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GTA 6's launch is expected to be so big that it will uplift the collective console market. Rockstar Games might be hailed as the savior of the modern games industry as a result. That might sound a little dramatic, but the analyst takes we've seen all point to GTA 6 being the largest video games launch in history: Some analysts think GTA 6 could sell 38 million copies and make $2.7 billion in the first year, and one venture capitalist firm lays outlandish predictions of GTA 6 earning $7.6 billion.

No publisher wants to go against GTA 6 due to the incredible drag effect of Rockstar's new Florida-based magnum opus. Even still, it's hard to see any game really competing with something as big as GTA 6. Well, except for maybe the other video game that has sold more copies than Xbox has consoles: GTA 5.

Circana analyst Mat Piscatella tells GamesIndustry.biz that GTA 5 is basically the biggest competitor to GTA 6, which makes sense given the game's high sales and the overall quality of the GTA experience itself.

"You look at something like Fortnite. It's been, what, seven, eight years now that that thing's been the biggest thing in the world. Or Minecraft. Grand Theft Auto 5 launched in 2013 [and] it's still one of the top 20 best-selling games every single month."

"The biggest competitor to Grand Theft Auto 6 will be Grand Theft Auto 5. [These are] wild times to try to make new video games."

This comparison is an apt one given GTA 5's astronomical performance. Since 2013, GTA 5 has shipped over 215 million copies worldwide across three console generations--Xbox 360/PS3, Xbox One/PS4, and Xbox Series X/S and PS5.

The GTA Online mode was critical to this long-term success, but the singleplayer mode is still played quite often to this day. The combination of multi-generational game sales alongside quarterly monetization in the tune of $100 million+ has pushed total Grand Theft Auto franchise earnings beyond $10 billion.

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