Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick seems pretty happy with this year’s Mafia: The Old Country. In a new interview, he said the relatively short and linear semi-open world action game proves that a lot of players will buy games that are focused, not super bloated, and offer a good story. And boy howdy, as someone who loves a nice weekend single-player game, I’m very happy to hear that.
In a recent interview with The Game Business newsletter, Zelnick talked about some of the successes Take-Two has had over the past few months. It turns out Borderlands 4 isn’t selling as well as expected, but the CEO blames that on PC issues and expects it to do well in the long term. On the flipside, Mafia: The Old Country, a different game published earlier this year by 2K (a wholly owned subsidiary of Take-Two), actually beat internal sales expectations. According to Zelnick, it proves that people want well-made, narrative-driven single-player games.
“What we suspected was confirmed,” Zelnick told the outlet. “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.”
Remember when everything wasn’t a live-service thing?
Released in August and developed by Hangar 13, The Old Country is a smaller game compared to past Mafia titles, only takes about 11 hours to complete, has no online components, and launched at a reduced price of $50. It’s also the kind of game we don’t really get anymore from AAA publishers like 2K: a big-budget, solo-only, linear action game that lacks a lot of replay value or in-game purchases. Back in the PS2 and even Xbox 360 eras of gaming, this was pretty standard stuff. Not so much anymore.
However, as Zelnick points out, there is definitely a demand for these types of games. I think a lot of people don’t have the time to dedicate to the latest big online hit, nor can they invest 200 hours into some giant open-world RPG. But a 10 to 12-hour action-adventure game with some great cutscenes, writing, and no bullshit? Yeah, that’s appealing to a lot of people, myself included.
Hopefully, Mafia: The Old Country‘s success can be used as a blueprint for Take-Two, and the publisher can greenlight similarly sized projects at its various studios. And we can play those games while we wait for Take-Two’s juggernaut, Grand Theft Auto 6, to finally release one day. Eventually.
About the Author
