“Grand Theft Auto 6” is expected to be released in fall 2025 by Rockstar Games.
The news was announced on Thursday when Rockstar’s parent company, Take-Two Interactive, released its fourth-quarter and full-year 2024 results, revealing that the company posted a $2.9 billion loss for the period. from January 1 to March 31.
Take-Two’s most recent guidance for the quarter called for a loss of between $170 million and $153 million. The company says the fourth-quarter tax loss of $2.9 billion included a $2.18 billion goodwill charge, a $304.3 million charge for acquisition-related expenses and costs restructuring of $93.3 million.
Take-Two isn’t willing to get any more specific than ‘fall 2025’ for ‘GTA VI’ release date, with CEO Strauss Zelnick saying ‘I think we’ll leave it there for now’ , in an interview with Variety ahead of the company’s quarterly earnings conference call at 4:30 p.m. ET on Thursday. “This (announcement) will come from Rockstar and will be consistent with how they market the title,” Zelnick said.
The trailer for the highly anticipated ‘Grand Theft Auto 6’ broke YouTube viewership records when it was released in December, indicating the extreme demand for the title more than a decade after the release of ‘GTA V’ .
The Take-Two chief also addressed recent layoffs at the company – and across the gaming industry as a whole – saying he doesn’t foresee further cuts coming.
“We think we’re in a really good position now,” Zelnick said. We’ve had three cost reduction programs recently: a $100 million program, which we passed as part of the Zynga integration in 2022, a $50 million program, which we passed, and now, more recently, a $165 million program. cost control and real cost reduction. Our three-pronged strategy is to be the most creative, efficient and innovative company in the entertainment industry. We don’t always succeed, but we certainly try. I think that puts us in a very strong position from an efficiency standpoint.
Zelnick says he expects Take-Two to complete its acquisition of Gearbox “relatively soon,” which will bring the developer of “Borderlands” and “Tiny Tina’s Wonderland” in-house for the 2K franchise publisher. It also forecasts sequential revenue growth for Take-Two in fiscal years 2025, 2026 and 2027.
For Take-Two’s latest quarter, Wall Street is forecasting earnings per share (EPS) of 9 cents on $1.3 billion in net bookings, according to analyst consensus data provided by LSEG, formerly Refinitiv. Take-Two reported a loss per share of $17.02 on $1.35 billion in net bookings, compared to the year-ago quarter, when it reported a loss of $610.3 million and net bookings of $1.39 billion.
Net bookings for the quarter were “NBA 2K24,” which sold more than 9 million units, “Grand Theft Auto Online” and “Grand Theft Auto V,” “Toon Blast,” “Empires & Puzzles » and mobile games “Red”. Dead Redemption 2” and “Red Dead Online”, “WWE 2K24”, “Match Factory!” ”, “Words With Friends” and “Merge Dragons!” »
For the full 2024 fiscal year, which included results from April 1, 2023 to March 31, 2024, Take-Two reported total revenue of $5.35 billion and a net loss of $3.7 billion.
Take-Two expects net bookings of $5.55 billion to $5.65 billion for its 2025 fiscal year, which runs from April 1, 2024 to March 31, 2025, and a net loss of between $674 million and $606 million.
“Grand Theft Auto 6” will be released in Take-Two’s fiscal 2026, meaning the company is not attributing any of the estimated fiscal 2025 revenue to the game’s upcoming release.
For the current quarter from April 1 to June 30, 2024, Take-Two forecasts net bookings of $1.2 billion to $1.25 billion and revenue of $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion. The net loss is projected at $272 million to $245 million, or a loss of $1.58 to $1.43 per share.
Take-Two stock closed Thursday at $146.08 per share. Regular U.S. stock markets will reopen Friday at 9:30 a.m. ET.
News Source : variety.com
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