I, among many other Zelda fans, have never had any doubt that the highly anticipated upcoming remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time on Switch 2 would have any problem whatsoever competing with Grand Theft Auto 6—a game that many other publishers have run from since its first release date was revealed. This is, after all, widely considered one of the greatest games ever made, and in light of the following The Legend of Zelda has been able to build up over 40 years, GTA 6, from a distance, looks like it poses almost no threat at all to the Ocarina of Time remake. However, not everyone seems to think so, including a former Nintendo marketing lead.
In Episode 239 of the Kit & Krysta Podcast on YouTube, Krysta Yang, former PR manager for Nintendo of America, said, “If it happened, where [Ocarina of Time] was on the same day as GTA, and I saw that this was a faithful remake, I would be playing GTA.” That statement alone poses a really interesting question about whether the Ocarina of Time remake, in its presumed state, would actually be able to compete with GTA 6, were their respective release dates closer to one another. Again, looking at these two games from a distance, and depending on which side of the aisle you’re on, Ocarina of Time might automatically look like the winner in a head-to-head battle with GTA 6. But Yang inadvertently made an intriguing point about that battle: can a faithful remake of the greatest game ever made actually compete with a highly anticipated brand-new game from a massively beloved franchise, especially when that game is already expected to have a record-breaking release?
GTA 6 Might Have One Big Advantage Over Ocarina of Time
I think Yang’s comment gets at something that is easy to overlook when comparing these two games purely by the strength of their names, especially because Ocarina of Time is one of the most beloved games ever made and therefore seems almost untouchable from a distance. However, most of the people who are especially excited about the remake already know what happens in it, and if Nintendo really is keeping the experience as faithful as it currently appears to be, many of us probably have a pretty good idea of what we’re getting from beginning to end. None of that makes me less excited for it, of course, because I’ve played the original more times than I can count, and I’m still going to disappear into the remake the moment it launches. But it does make the urgency surrounding it a little different from what GTA 6 has going for it.
Where GTA 6 has an advantage is that players have been waiting more than a decade for a brand-new Grand Theft Auto, so just about everything waiting for them in Rockstar’s next game is going to feel new. Even with everything Rockstar has already shown, there is still an enormous amount about the game players don’t know, which means its launch is going to be as much about discovering what GTA 6 actually is as it is finally getting to play it. If I’m interested in both games, and they’re sitting in front of me on the same day, I can pretty easily tell myself that Ocarina of Time will still be there once I’m finished with GTA 6. Making that same decision in reverse is a little harder when I’ve already experienced one of those games before.
What makes Yang’s answer so interesting to me, then, isn’t that she would choose GTA 6 over Ocarina of Time, but why she would apparently make that choice in the first place. She didn’t say she had no interest in Nintendo’s remake or suggest that Ocarina of Time couldn’t compete with Rockstar’s next game. Her answer specifically hinged on the remake being faithful, which is a pretty important distinction when Nintendo has so far gone out of its way to preserve so much of the original experience. For players who want both games, Ocarina of Time doesn’t necessarily have to lose their interest for GTA 6 to become a problem. It may only need to become the game they’re willing to play second.
Ocarina of Time’s November 5 Release Date Matters More Than It Seemed
Fortunately for Nintendo, the current release schedule doesn’t actually force players to make that choice, with Ocarina of Time set to launch on November 5 and GTA 6 arriving two weeks later on November 19. I’ve previously argued that two weeks may be more than enough time for plenty of longtime Ocarina of Time players to get through the remake, especially if its overall structure remains close enough to the original that veterans aren’t going to spend much time figuring out where to go or what to do. I still believe that, but Yang’s comments have made me think the distance between those two release dates is doing much more for Nintendo than I originally gave it credit for.
Where GTA 6 has an advantage is that players have been waiting more than a decade for a brand-new Grand Theft Auto, so just about everything waiting for them in Rockstar’s next game is going to feel new.
By launching on November 5, Ocarina of Time gets something it probably wouldn’t have if Nintendo put it directly beside GTA 6, because players who want both don’t actually have to choose yet. They can pick up the remake when it releases, spend the next couple of weeks back in Hyrule, and then move on to Rockstar’s game once November 19 rolls around. More importantly, Ocarina of Time gets a launch window where GTA 6 isn’t already dominating, which is going to be much harder for almost any game to accomplish once Rockstar finally opens the floodgates.
That also makes November 5 feel like a much more important date than I thought it was when Nintendo first announced it, because even a relatively small delay would start eating into one of the remake’s biggest advantages. Moving back a week would leave only seven days between the two games, while slipping all the way to November 19 would create the exact situation Yang was talking about. At that point, Nintendo would be asking players who are interested in both to decide whether they want to revisit one of the greatest games ever made or finally see what Rockstar has been working on for more than a decade, and I don’t think Nintendo can simply assume nostalgia wins that battle every time.
As someone who is absolutely going to be playing Ocarina of Time on day one, I still don’t think Nintendo needs to be afraid of GTA 6 in the same way other publishers seemingly have been. This is still a remake people have been asking for forever, and the Zelda name is hardly going to disappear beneath Rockstar’s shadow just because the two games are releasing in the same month. But Yang’s comment has changed how I look at that November 5 date, because Nintendo may have found the safest possible way to put Ocarina of Time next to GTA 6 without actually making them compete head-to-head.
Rockstar’s biggest threat to Ocarina of Time was probably never going to be convincing Zelda fans not to play it anyway. What Nintendo has to avoid is giving those same players a reason to decide they’ll play it later, and launching two weeks before GTA 6 might be precisely what keeps that from happening.
- Released
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November 5, 2026
- ESRB
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Everyone 10+ / Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence
- Developer(s)
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Nintendo
- Publisher(s)
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Nintendo
