2025 could very well be the best year in video games sales to date | Opinion

gamesindustry.biz:

It is beginning to look like 2025 is shaping up to be one of the biggest years in video games, if not the biggest.

Let us start with the obvious: the release of GTA 6.

When it comes to the most successful video entertainment products of all time, for many franchises like Star Wars, the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe), Avatar or maybe Mario come to mind. This is because there are numerous releases (sometimes multiple in a year) that keep these respective franchises alive in the minds of consumers. All have posted multi-billion dollar revenues. I would venture that by comparison to Grand Theft Auto these products pale into insignificance given the amount of investment needed to keep these franchises alive.

The major difference for me is that Rockstar Games, with Take-Two publishing, have arguably made the most successful entertainment franchise ever with just three to five games since the release of GTA 3 back in 2001. The rolling snowball of ongoing revenue since the time of GTA 3 has become an avalanche of wealth by the time sales for GTA 5 have begun to recede. That avalanche of wealth is set to grow even larger with GTA 6.

You do not need to go far to see evidence of this. When new films break the $1 billion barrier, it is often achieved after several weeks at the box office. For example, according to Elle Palmer's article in The Verge, entitled The ten fastest movies to reach $1 billion at the box office, to date the fastest selling film was 2019's Avengers: Endgame which passed the $1 billion mark by its fifth day in market.

Momentum, passion and pent-up demand built by GTA 5 has already translated into huge expectation for GTA 6

By contrast GTA 5 made $1 billion in its first three days of release, beating Avengers: Endgame by two days. This achievement does not even take into accounting inflation. GTA 5 released in 2013 and using a US inflation calculator $1 billion in 2013 equates to $1.1 billion by 2019, an adjustment of an additional 10%. A glance at the GTA 5