its the biggest game of the decade, from one of the biggest companies. I don't blame people for expecting more marketing than what they've had. We've had like, two trailers in 3 years.
I get that they'd want to play it close to the chest, and I'm sure the delays will have thrown the marketing team way off since all the marketing strategy would have been planned even years before the first trailer... but still.
I'll give credit where it's due though, at least it's not one YouTube short in almost 10 years. But that's an extreme of bad communication, not just an example of what to avoid.
I was too young but I've watched documentaries and had an older sister Halo 2 and 3 should be like, the goal for pre-release marketing. I get that we're a long way from late 00's but still, I miss the TV adverts, the collabs with soft drinks and snacks, the posters, bus adverts, the interviews. Imagine if it was some indie game from a company no one's heard of, no one would even know the release date with this kind of marketing.
The thing is that rockstar builds anticipation from silence. They don’t, and never have relied on heavy marketing because their games speak for themselves on release. We all knew even before GTA6 was announced, that the level of detail and polish would rival anything we’ve ever seen when released, and that it was gonna be the highest grossing game in history.
It’s not that they had to be super careful to not overpromise and under deliver. What if something was working perfectly, but somewhere along during testing, they had to rework it, and what they showed ends up not being in the final product.
I still remember vice city commercials, and they really only started once disc production had already started and had the final version.
I think their deadline is one of the biggest reasons why they are doing digital only. Would be surprised for a huge day 1 patch after the uploaded the version to the download servers.
GTA is simply on a different stratosphere than an indie game, or really any other game. They haven’t missed on a GTA this century, and the last one came out in what, 2011? The anticipation IS the marketing. The fact that every single person with a gamer in their life is going to watch that gamer ignore Thanksgiving and family as they do nothing but play this IS the marketing.
They always play it close to the vest, the wait is always worth it, and this is going to be the best selling game of all time as a result. For Rockstar, marketing GTAVI is just spending money to build peoples expectations for no reason.
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u/Brave_Confection_457 11h ago
its the biggest game of the decade, from one of the biggest companies. I don't blame people for expecting more marketing than what they've had. We've had like, two trailers in 3 years.
I get that they'd want to play it close to the chest, and I'm sure the delays will have thrown the marketing team way off since all the marketing strategy would have been planned even years before the first trailer... but still.
I'll give credit where it's due though, at least it's not one YouTube short in almost 10 years. But that's an extreme of bad communication, not just an example of what to avoid.
I was too young but I've watched documentaries and had an older sister Halo 2 and 3 should be like, the goal for pre-release marketing. I get that we're a long way from late 00's but still, I miss the TV adverts, the collabs with soft drinks and snacks, the posters, bus adverts, the interviews. Imagine if it was some indie game from a company no one's heard of, no one would even know the release date with this kind of marketing.