Grand Theft Auto 6 is just nine months away from launch, and there’s still no word on its price. Publishers allegedly “hope” that it will cost as much as $100, allowing them to raise prices themselves, but all that Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick had to say was that the company has always adopted a “variable pricing” policy.
Whatever the price ends up being, $80 has already proven controversial, with Xbox walking back plans to sell its flagship exclusives at that figure due to mounting backlash. Gearbox—after much controversy around CEO Randy Pitchford’s comments—likewise stuck with the standard $70 for Borderlands 4. Yet, surprisingly, a new survey (translated by ResetEra user nolifebr) revealed that one in three Brazilians believes $100 would be a “fair” price for GTA 6.
To put that into perspective, Trading Economics reports that the average Brazilian makes roughly $639 per month. So, if GTA 6 were to be priced at $100, it would equal around 15 percent of their income. Games are also far more expensive in Brazil than in the US, and already saw a price increase earlier this year, with Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 rising from R$349 to R$449, i.e. from $64 to $82. In the US, it only costs $59.99.
Brazilians Are Prepared To Pay $100 For GTA 6, So Why Aren’t You?
It’s widely speculated that GTA 6 will cost between R$500 and R$600, roughly $92 to $110, which far exceeds even those figures. Yet 33.2 percent of the 1,200 participants marked this as a “fair” price point, while 24.2 percent plan to buy the game at launch, even if they think the price is too high.
“Some of those who think it’s expensive still agree to pay,” Go Gamers and ESPM professor Mauro Berimbau explained. “It’s what we call the cost of belonging—the person accepts paying more to be present in the collective experience.”
As GameRanx states, though, if GTA 6 were to cost $100 in the US, it would likely be even more expensive in Brazil because of the country’s markup. However, even with this uncertainty, many of the survey’s participants are already taking measures to prepare for the game’s launch. 49.9 percent intend to buy the game day one, 20.6 percent have purchased or built a new PC in anticipation, and 20 percent have bought new equipment, such as headsets, mice, and controllers, to complement the experience.
So, $100 might not be such a controversial figure after all, at least for a game like GTA 6. But it’s already shaping up to be one of the biggest video games in the medium’s history, with analysts expecting it to make over $7 billion in two months. Bogging that down in potential controversy might not be worth the risk for Take-Two. As Zelnick said, “If you create a huge hit, and everyone wants it and everyone buys it, the revenue is going to take care of itself.”
