Grand Theft Auto VI won’t be cheap, but it’s not going to be nearly as expensive as some pundits predicted. The bad news for people hoping they could play the game on their Nintendo Switch 2 is that they’ll be forced to pick up an ever-more-expensive PlayStation 5 or Xbox to play it day one.
Take-Two Interactive, the game’s publisher, has set the base price of GTA VI at $80 when it launches on November 19. There is a $100 “Ultimate Edition” that comes with extra in-game items and “action threaded across all aspects of Jason and Lucia’s story.” We don’t know what the hell that means, but at least Take-Two confirmed the game goes up for preorder at midnight local time on June 25. Developer Rockstar Games has determined the game will remain exclusive to the PlayStation 5, PS5 Pro, and the Xbox Series X and Series S consoles.
What’s more, all copies of GTA VI will be a digital edition. Anybody who buys the physical version will simply receive a slip of cardboard with a download code. Rockstar has not yet confirmed the game’s file size, but we don’t expect it to be small by any margin. For reference, GTA V can take up anywhere between 105GB and 125GB, depending on platform, according to Rockstar Games.
At least, you won’t have to pay $100 for Grand Theft Auto VI, despite some analysts extolling the price point in the lead-up to the game’s fall launch. You just won’t get a PC or Switch 2 version, but we can hope those will come in the future.
Take-Two boss Strauss Zelnick previously hinted in interviews that he has at least considered bringing the game to Nintendo’s latest handheld console. After all, the Switch 2 has proven to be plenty capable of playing some relatively demanding games, like Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth and Cyberpunk 2077, thanks to the help of Nvidia’s DLSS upscaling and some extra in-game optimizations. Even if the developer proves the game is playable on the lower-power Xbox Series S, it would have to work some serious magic to port it to the Switch 2. There’s no way the game would fit entirely on a 64GB Switch 2 game card. If GTA VI ever gets a release down the road, Rockstar Games would have to opt for a game-key card, digital download, or code in a box.
Nintendo is currently the only company still promoting $80 games. Initially, it pushed Mario Kart World as such a massive title that it deserved the higher price point. A year after the Switch 2 launch, the only other $80 game confirmed for the platform is set to be the physical copy of Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave. The digital version of that game costs $70, since Nintendo now sells game cards for more than their downloadable copies.
Take-Two is looking at the broader gaming industry for guidance on how much gamers are willing to pay. Gaming is already getting too expensive thanks to console price hikes. The Switch 2 will soon cost $500. A PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X both start at $600 for models without an optical drive. GTA VI will indeed be a “premium” experience, but it may push us into a future where gaming becomes even more of a costly luxury than it already is.
