According to Devolver Digital co-founder Nigel Lowrie, Rockstar Games’ upcoming GTA 6 is the first ever “AAAAA Game” the industry has seen, which easily towers above everything else the Gaming industry has to offer at this point in time. Speaking to IGN, he stated:
“I mean, there are AAA games and then there’s AAAA games and I’d argue that Grand Theft Auto is potentially the AAAAA game; it’s just bigger than anything else both in the scope and scale of the game and the kind of cultural impact that it has and the attention it demands.”
And looking at the overall legacy and influence of the series, it’s hard to argue for sure. In many ways, GTA has transcended gaming and has become a kind of unique cultural entity of it’s own that continues to break new ground across generations and boundaries.
Devolver has also recently delayed their own game Baby Steps due to Hollow Knight: Silksong’s release which is a similar situation many other developers have found themselves with the impending release of GTA 6 as well.
“You can’t AB test reality,” he said. “Maybe Baby Steps would’ve just been fine September 8, it could have been. But am I willing to risk this team’s livelihood and the future of the game they’ve worked on for five years to see if they both work out? I’m not. And I also want to listen to what they want, and what they want is to have their own spotlight and I couldn’t agree more.”
He also stated that GTA 6 continues to be a dominating factor in terms of game releases for most companies out there:
“I would say that GTA for the last year and a half has been a part of almost every conversation around launch dates I have heard,” Lieb said.
But it’s still up in the air whether GTA 6 will actually make it to the current announced date though one thing’s for sure, if there’s indeed another delay, it’d definitely be a much shorter one.
And as of right now, GTA 6 probably has even more hype behind it than what GTA 5 did when it came out over a decade ago, with both of it’s trailers breaking viewership records twice. This really suggests that upon release, GTA 6 could garner revenue that was previously unimaginable not just for a videogame but for any entertainment property in history.
Grand Theft Auto 6 is currently slated to launch for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S on May 26, 2026.
