Just days ahead of the launch of Grand Theft Auto 6, Take-Two Interactive CEO has nothing but praise for Nintendo for its release of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Remake. In an interview with GamesBeat, Zelnick was asked about whether Ocarina of Time Remake is seen as a competitor at Take-Two, to which he responded by saying that “It’s terrific, and they should be very proud of the title.”
He went on to note that Take-Two is essentially competing “against everything and nothing” due to its presence in the larger entertainment industry. This is due to the fact that customers tend to have many options for how they might want to spend their time, which can range from playing some games to watching a movie. He even brings up a direct comparison with food, noting that it is a must-have for people, while entertainment isn’t a must-have.
“In the entertainment business, you compete against everything and nothing. Everything because there’s so many ways consumers can spend their time, and nothing because if there’s nothing good out there, people don’t need to consume any of it. It’s like food; like food could be bad, but you still are going to be hungry. But in the case of entertainment, it’s not a must-have; it’s a want-to-have. So, it’s our job to make the best entertainment on earth. When we do that, people will show up for it.”
Zelnick also further discussed the idea that GTA 6 may have eaten into the potential sales of NBA 2K27. While he had acknowledged this earlier in the week, in the more recent interview, he also discussed the idea that it may have been too crowded in September due to games moving their release dates around to avoid Grand Theft Auto 6. Despite this, the fact that NBA 2K27 is the franchise’s second-best launch ever still makes him quite happy.
“We feel great on NBA 2K27, and for the remainder of our year, we have more and better content coming than ever before. So, I couldn’t feel better about it than I do. That said, it was a bit of a crowded time as people got out of the way of GTA VI; our sports title did significantly better pound for pound than our competitors, which were all down materially year over year. So, we feel as good as we possibly can, and there probably were some exogenous circumstances, including some caused by our very own company, to affect the market.”
Grand Theft Auto 6 is making its way to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on November 19th. In the meantime, Nintendo has released The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Remake exclusively on the Nintendo Switch 2. For more details, take a look at our review.
On the subject of GTA 6, pre-order performance for the title has been quite strong, according to recent data from analytics firm Sensor Tower, which has reported that the title has already generated more than $1 billion in revenue thanks to 7.71 million sales.
