With the Grand Theft Auto 6 release date confirmed, fans face an agonising wait before they can get their hands on the latest entry in the blockbuster video game series. But according to new data, even when the wait is over, GTA 6 will remain unplayable for 50% of PlayStation owners — leaving millions unable to enjoy the title.
That's because half of all monthly active users on PlayStation still rely on the 11-year-old PS4 console. Of the 118 million people playing on PlayStation every month, only 59 million have upgraded to the PlayStation 5.
Unfortunately for the remaining 59 million, Grand Theft Auto VI will not release on the console on launch day. For now, Take-Two Interactive, the parent company of Rockstar Games, has only confirmed plans to release GTA 6 on the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S ...with rumours swirling that an incoming PS5 Pro console will be timed to capitalise on the launch.
Rockstar Games hasn't confirmed the existence of a PC version of the next Grand Theft Auto. Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick was recently asked whether the Grand Theft Auto VI would make its way over to PC players and replied: "Rockstar has an approach to platforms which we’ve seen before, and they’ll make more announcements in due time.
"I do believe that the right strategy for our business is to be where the consumer is, and historically what this company has done is address consumers anywhere they are, on any platform that makes sense over time."
That seems like a pretty strong hint that Rockstar Games will follow the same release strategy as previous entries in the Grand Theft Auto series. The Scottish studio has historically prioritised console releases, before launching a PC version of the same game within a few years of the original release date.
With Grand Theft Auto VI confirmed to launch on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S next year, we could see a PC version of the satirical crime thriller launch sometime in late 2025 or beyond.
When the launch finally arrives, Grand Theft Auto fans will have been waiting an astonishing 12 years between instalments in the best-selling series. During that interval, Rockstar Games has released Grand Theft Auto V on three generations of console, starting with the Xbox 360 and Sony PS3 back in September 2013.
An upgraded version of the game launched on the latest crop of video game consoles, Xbox Series X|S and Sony PS5, in March 2022 with support for 4K Ultra HD visuals, ray-tracing, 60 frames-per-second, and 3D audio. The continued popularity of the game is partly attributed to GTA Online.
Experts believe the next instalment in the Grand Theft Auto franchise could break its own record sales numbers. Its predecessor, Grand Theft Auto V, still holds the crown for the best opening week of sales in video game history — raking in $1.15bn (£1.2bn) in five days. It has gone on to become the second biggest game of all-time, although it's still 100 million copies behind the Gold Medalist, Minecraft.
But many like Dmitri Williams, a video game business expert and professor at University of Southern California, expect the long-awaited follow-up to perform even better. He said: "The brand is as strong or stronger than it was before, but additionally the game industry is larger. If it maintains the same slice of the pie, it's going to be big, because it will come from a bigger pie.
"The games industry is simply massive globally, and is no single genre or platform. It's so large and so varied that even fractions of it are larger than whole parallel industries like movies.”
GTA6 Trailer
For those who haven't followed the latest whispers, the incoming instalment of the popular Grand Theft Auto series will take gamers back to Vice City, which last appeared in 2006's Vice City Stories.
Rockstar Games has already confirmed the franchise will use a female protagonist for the first time since 2000, known as Lucia. Little is known about the plot of the satirical action-adventure game, but it's widely expected to mirror the misadventures of Bonnie and Clyde across a fictional US State that spoofs on Florida, dubbed Leonida.
