With streamers and influencers now shaping much of the gaming conversation, reviews from major gaming outlets like IGN and GameSpot may not seem as influential as they once were. Nevertheless, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick, the publisher of Grand Theft Auto 6, insists critics’ voices still matter. His comments come just as rumors swirl that Rockstar Games may be planning an unusual strategy to keep the GTA 6 launch reviews under stricter control. Speaking to The Game Business, Zelnick was asked whether critical reception remains important in today’s gaming landscape. His answer was a simple ‘of course,’ and he believes it matters as much today ‘as it has in the past.’
“Rockstar’s scores are typically in the mid-90s, sometimes high 90s. Not many games can say that. And that’s a reflection on Rockstar’s commitment to quality,” explained Zelnick. He also trusts that GTA Online will stay popular even after GTA 6 is released.
No doubt that GTA 6 will become one of the biggest entertainment launches for the last 10 years and sell like hotcakes. However, releasing a big-budget, high-quality game itself might just not be enough anymore. After all, GTA 6 O’Clock content director Dan Dawkins argued that social media has changed how games are discussed and reviewed today.
On The Game Business Show podcast, Dawkins added that a decade ago, it was easier to ‘handpick’ critics and give them an opportunity for early review. But now a viral social media post can easily spin the conversation by simply being the first to declare that things are ‘rubbish.’
We are 13 years past the release of GTA 5. The media and cultural environment has completely transformed. At that point in time, let’s say 2014, it was easier – not easy, but easier – to handpick the journalists you wanted to review that game ahead of time.
Social media is so noisy. And someone has to be first to say the thing you like is rubbish. Someone will do that. All narratives are available at once now about everything. Rockstar are going to get, from the gates, some dissenting voices. Does it mean the game is any more or less brilliant? I don’t know. But there is going to be dissenting voices.
Dawkins’ remarks are particularly interesting in light of a recent rumor. Previously, we reported that a Brazilian journalist claimed that the media may not receive GTA 6 review copies ahead of launch. “No one will receive the key to this game,” journalist Pedro Henrique Lutti Lippe said, according to a translation through Google Translate. Instead, according to Lippe, Rockstar might invite critics to a private review event.
The development studio hasn’t commented on the hearsay that it’s withholding early GTA 6 review codes. Even so, it’s not hard to see why Take-Two and Rockstar might consider such an approach, taking into account what Dawkins said. It could suggest that the company might prefer to have more control over the game’s first wave of impressions. Instead of letting hot takes and outrage bait steer the conversation around it.
