"Grand Theft Auto (GTA)," the world's most popular game series, has begun pre-orders for its next installment, "GTA 6." As a franchise with a powerful fanbase and the first official sequel in 13 years, attention is focused on whether it can extend its box-office legend of "recouping all development costs immediately after launch" this time as well.
On Thursday, news spread rapidly across global online communities and social network services (SNS) that "GTA 6," the new title from developer Rockstar Games, sold 39 million copies within one day of pre-orders, with estimated revenue reaching $3 billion (about 4.61 trillion won). Rockstar Games opened GTA 6's official pre-order purchase page at midnight local time the previous day.
If the figures are true, Rockstar Games would recoup its entire total production cost of approximately $3 billion (estimated) before the game is even officially released.
The GTA series is considered an unrivaled intellectual property (IP) that has recorded the highest revenue in the history of the global game industry. An open-world genre set in modern American cities, its core involves enjoying high-freedom crime content such as store robberies, shooting sprees, and vehicle chases, or carrying out various main missions.
The previous title, "GTA 5," released in 2013, set a major record by earning $800 million within one day of release and immediately recouping its investment. It went on to sell more than 230 million copies across all platforms, ranking as the second best-selling video game title in global game history.
With this unprecedented popularity and record, combined with the long development period, market expectations for "GTA 6" have reached a peak. Within the game industry, warnings circulated early on that "new titles must absolutely avoid the GTA 6 launch schedule." Indeed, the first trailer video released in December 2023 surpassed 90 million views within 24 hours of release, proving explosive interest.
Meanwhile, "GTA 6" will be officially released on November 19 for the PlayStation 5 (PS5) and Xbox Series X|S platforms. Domestic launch prices have been set at 89,800 won for the standard edition and 112,800 won for the ultimate edition. For the first time in the series, the new title will be released only as a digital download version without a physical package (storage media), and the PC platform has been excluded from this initial launch lineup.
