As Take-Two Interactive reported strong results for Q3 FY 2025 and readied investors for a blockbuster year that includes the release of Rockstar's long anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6, Strauss Zelnick, Chairman and CEO of Take-Two Interactive, took the time to talk to GamesIndustry.biz about the results and some of the biggest issues facing the industry in 2025.The interview below has been edited for brevity and clarity. Take-Two has a diverse portfolio this year, could you speak about the balance between more annualized properties and the space you give creative teams for more long term projects? This is a strategy that we began talking about when we took over the company in 2007.
So it's been a long time in development and we've had years where, you know, where we were able to execute it rather well and other years where we just haven't been able to do it, but our view has always been that the only titles that really ought to be annualised are selected number of sports entertainment titles and pretty much everything else should not be annualised for two reasons;Number one, to make sure that you put out as perfect a product as possible to please your consumers and to build a franchise as opposed to dilute a franchise over time.And secondly, to create anticipation, to create desire.
And if you know something that's coming like clockwork every year, I think it's harder to create that anticipation and desire.
We're seeing that extraordinary anticipation with regard to GTA 6, for example. but I think you're also going to see anticipation with regard to Mafia.
Right now, today, in Early Access, we've seen the enormous enthusiasm around the Civilisation 7.So when we get it right, we have a year like the next calendar year, this calendar year shaping up to be, where we have beloved franchises bringing back iterations that do take years, sometimes many years to create.