The most common phrase heard in the gaming industry right now is “Survive until 2025.”
The hope, or even expectation, is that next year the video game business will recover after two years of faltering sales and mass layoffs.
There are several reasons for this expectation. First, there is the belief that we will see continued economic recovery and falling inflation rates, which should result in increased consumer spending and investment. Second, the launch of a new Nintendo console should lead to increased interest and sales of new games.
And third… Grand Theft Auto 6.
Let's face it, the next GTA will be a major milestone for gaming. If all goes well, it should be the biggest entertainment release of all time. It will put the spotlight on the industry (for better or worse), boost retail sales, increase gaming media traffic, and also help shift hardware.
Of course, it won't benefit everyone. For game publishers and developers not named Rockstar, GTA 6 isn't exactly going to help them. In fact, any game that dares to launch within Grand Theft Auto's six-week launch radius does so at its own peril. Meanwhile, live service games should prepare for a precipitous drop in average playtime.
However, one thing some in the industry are hoping for from GTA 6 is that it helps overcome “the PS4 problem.”
We've talked a lot about the decline of the gaming console business, highlighting the slightly slower pace of console sales this generation compared to the previous one. However, things are more promising, especially for PlayStation, when we start to consider other metrics.
“We expect Rockstar to continue to operate GTA Online for the foreseeable future, but the user base will be divided following the release of GTA 6. Rockstar has never faced this type of transition challenge.”
Piers Harding-Rolls, Ampere Analysis
For example, PS5 revenue is up significantly compared to PS4. But in terms of overall active users, the numbers look healthy – it’s just that many of those active users are still playing on PS4.
Whether or not this is a problem is subjective. Back in May, Sony revealed that 50% of its audience is still playing games on its oldest machine, even as we approach the fourth anniversary of the PS5’s launch. It’s not unusual for older-gen machines to still be played for years after their replacements have arrived, but things are more significant this time around in part due to the popularity of live service titles.
Newzoo's latest playtime chart shows that the most played PlayStation games over the past two months have been Fortnite, Call of Duty, EA Sports FC 24, GTA 5, Roblox, Minecraft, Rocket League, XDefiant, Rainbow Six: Siege, and NBA 2K24.
Only one of those games, Ubisoft’s XDefiant (which launched in May), isn’t on PS4. Minecraft is on the verge of getting a native PS5 release (so far, PS5 players have only been able to download the PS4 version). Meanwhile, market analysts Ampere say that of GTA Online’s 20 million-plus active users, the most active platform for the game “by far” is PS4.
In other words, almost all of the biggest PlayStation games right now run on PS4 (and run well), and that reduces the need, from a consumer perspective, to upgrade their hardware, particularly during times of economic instability and high cost of living.
Obviously, it also presents an opportunity. PlayStation remains optimistic that the PS5 will be a bigger platform than the PS4 because it knows that at some point, a lot of that PS4 base will want to upgrade, especially as their hardware starts to age, slow down, or fail. Of course, Sony will need to be careful that these players stay on PlayStation, especially with Xbox improving its release slate, Nintendo introducing new hardware, PC games continuing to perform well, and even mobile and tablet devices showing their high-end gaming potential. But ultimately, they’re PlayStation customers right now, so it’s Sony’s fanbase that loses out.
At this point, I think Grand Theft Auto could play a big role for all video game companies. Right now, developers are caught between moving forward with the latest hardware and maintaining support for the older one. And indeed, this is something that Rockstar will have to deal with.
“When GTA 6 launches, there will be more GTA Online players who have moved to newer consoles,” says Ampere’s Senior Game Analyst Piers Harding-Rolls. “Still, there will likely still be a significant portion of players on older devices and PCs. As such, Ampere expects Rockstar to continue to operate GTA Online for the foreseeable future, but this will mean maintaining multiple communities as the user base will be split after the launch of GTA 6.”
“Rockstar has never faced this type of transition challenge before, although parent company Take-Two has extensive experience with its live sports franchises, which regularly shift audiences to new annual releases. The current commercial importance of the GTA franchise leaves very little room for error in transitioning and supporting its loyal audience as the new game rolls out.”
But if there's one game that could push gamers to upgrade their console, it's Grand Theft Auto. And if Sony and Microsoft have plans to release upgraded, portable versions of their latest machines, as reports suggest, then 2025 could prove to be a very important year for the future of gaming consoles, even before you factor in Nintendo.
Of course, the situation begs a broader question… what could the PlayStation 6 be like? In many ways, the Xbox Series S and X were continuations of the Xbox One. Faster, more powerful, but with the same interface, the same controllers, and all of their own first-party games, they were cross-generational. By contrast, Sony claimed it “believed in generations,” and introduced the PS5 with a new UI, a new controller, new accessories, and (at least some) PS5-exclusive games.
If it takes gamers five years (or more) to move from one generation to the next, and AAA games take four or five years to develop, does the seven-year generational cycle still work? Unless Sony's engineers and hardware teams can create a product that offers a significant change in how games look and feel, I'm not convinced that they will.
That's the problem that will be solved tomorrow. For now, PlayStation's opportunity is to get its remaining fans to ditch their DualShocks and switch to a DualSense. To do that, it's going to take something special, and all eyes are on Grand Theft Auto 6.