While the biggest news out of Take-Two’s latest earnings call was a disappointing 6 month delay for GTA 6, CEO Strauss Zelnick also took some time to discuss the success of August release Mafia: The Old Country. The prequel title was priced at just $50 on release, a gamble that Zelnick says paid off.
A Mafia prequel set in Sicily in the early 1900s, Mafia: The Old Country is more linear and story-driven than other games in the franchise. 2K games promoted the title as a polished, condensed experience that doesn’t require a massive time commitment from players, and priced the game to match.
Take-Two’s latest earnings report revealed that Mafia: The Old Country quickly outperformed the company’s expectations for it. “What we suspected was confirmed,” Zelnick said in an interview with The Game Business. “Which is just… if you give consumers a great narrative experience that’s a lot of fun, somewhat contained, and at a fair price, then you can have the perfect result.”
In the earnings call, Zelnick said that The Old Country’s success means we can expect to see more cinematic titles in the same vein from Hangar 13, both in the Mafia franchise and in “future creative pursuits.”
The Old Country’s success was a high point in Take-Two’s earning call, with the latest GTA 6 delay causing the company’s stock price to plummet, and the company revealing that Borderlands 4 didn’t perform as well as Take-Two wanted.
Take-Two subsidiary Rockstar Games is also under fire, having been accused of union-busting over the recent firing of over 30 staff members. While Rockstar claims it fired workers for “gross misconduct” over leaking GTA 6 secrets, the union claims affected staffers were targeted for engaging in union activities.
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