Warhorse Studios co-founder Martin Klima recently explained that despite not being a fan of Grand Theft Auto or even understanding why so many people are excited about GTA 6, he’s happy to see Rockstar and Take-Two charging $80+ for the game, as he hopes it leads to the rest of the game industry feeling confident enough to raise prices.
In a new interview with PC Gamer, Klima explained that the game industry is in a bad situation. He told the outlet that game development is more expensive than ever, but audience growth has almost completely stalled while pubs and devs are already making as much as they can on digital storefronts. As he summed up to PC Gamer: “We destroyed retail, and we took all their money.” So the co-founder behind the studio that developed open-world RPG Kingdom Come: Deliverance and its sequel thinks the only real option left is to raise prices, even if the industry is, in his view, too nervous to do that.
“The last thing you can do is to increase the unit price,” said Klima. “That would help a lot, but everybody’s scared to death about it.”
Enter Grand Theft Auto 6‘s $80 price tag for the standard version of the game. The deluxe edition, which contains access to in-game shops and more, is $100. For Klima, this could be exactly what the industry needs.
“Now, hopefully, GTA will blaze the trail, and it will allow us to increase the cost,” said the co-founder. “[Rockstar and Take-Two are the only ones] who can afford, or who can dare, to increase the price of games, which I think is long overdue and also necessary for this business to survive. So I wish them all the luck.”
Funnily enough, Klima won’t be playing GTA 6 in November as he doesn’t find the franchise appealing. “And the reason why it is so popular—it beats me,” said Klima. “It’s something which I just fail to understand.”
Of course, I imagine many people reading this won’t agree with Klima’s claims about raising game prices. This console generation saw games jump from $60 to $70, a shift that many didn’t like and which continues to ruffle feathers. Jumping to $80 is likely going to come with even more backlash.