GTA 6 fans don't "go around buying nerdy niche" games, indie says, so fellow devs don't really need to get out of Rockstar's way

Almost every video game under the sun is running away from GTA 6's November release date, but indie developer Tomas Sala doesn't think that should necessarily be the case because the main audience for GTA 6 probably isn't rushing to buy the latest buzzy visual novel or management sim about running a movie rental store, let's say. The acclaimed developer behind aerial combat sim The Falconeer and its city-building sandbox spin-off Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles is gearing up to release another game in the gorgeous series: ShipShaper, a game about designing your own ships that's hitting early access on September 2. Speaking to GamesIndustry, Sala explains that when it came time to settle on a launch window for ShipShaper, he "saw all this stress about, 'Oh my God, GTA [6] is coming, you have to pack it before September.'" But despite squeezing into the crowd of new games seeking refuge from Rockstar Games' blockbuster, Sala doesn't think it was strictly necessary. As GamesIndustry notes, a 2025 Circana survey found that only 4% of US players buy a game more than once a month, and 33% of the US gaming audience buys a game less than once a year: "I'm pretty sure that's not the GTA audience." Some of the biggest games on PS5, Xbox, and Steam are often ones that came out years ago, too.