After GTA 6, the 2027 video game lineup looks stacked already

2027 looks stacked already

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Much of this is about the ever-swelling time it takes to make AAA games. This year, Grand Theft Auto 6 arrives eight years after Rockstar Games' last title, Red Dead Redemption 2. Playground Games' Fable is nearing the end of what will be a nine-year development cycle. The gaps between these releases were yawning wide before the pandemic slowed down development studios even more. The early 2020s were marked by long stretches without anything you could call a AAA game.

There was a sense, too, that the game industry was holding its breath for GTA 6. Now it's finally happening, there's a flurry of activity, with games like Marvel's Wolverine and Gears of War: E-Day jostling for position in the months before it. But if there was a fear that GTA 6's blast radius would also create a hangover after its release, with few games willing to creep out of its shadow, it's proven unfounded. Based on what was revealed at Summer Game Fest, 2027 looks like it's going to be a busy year — maybe even a vintage one.

In the first couple of months of 2027, we get the ambitious Yakuza offshoot Stranger Than Heaven, a Tomb Raider remake, Metro 2039, and the massive-sounding Fable. In spring: Final Fantasy 7 Revelation, Mass Effect spiritual successor Exodus, a new Spyro, and Forza rival Clutch.

Also coming at some point in 2027: Resident Evil Veronica, Clockwork Revolution, Pokémon Winds and Waves, Xenoblade Genesis. There is presumably a race on between Naughty Dog and Santa Monica Studio to see which of Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet and God of War Laufey can fill Sony's big PS5 exclusive slot for the year. (My bet's on Laufey.)

There's also a resurgent AA sector, as publishers look to find smaller-scale games that can still make a mark: Crazy Taxi, the stylish co-op game Kemuri, Senua, Until Dawn 2. There are releases that defy this kind of categorization but still have the potential to leave a major mark, like The Witcher 3's 11-years-later expansion Songs of the Past, and the beta for MMO hopeful Guild Wars 3. And of course, there are still a few wild cards left to play. We don't know what Nintendo has up its sleeve. (3D Mario?) Ditto Blizzard. (StarCraft shooter?) Maybe it will be time for Dragon Quest 12.

It sounds like a busy year. It sounds like a fun year, if not a classic one. There's variety here, and signs of some (if definitely not all) publishers and big studios being willing to try something different, something that might help them break out of the industry's general state of entropy, something that might be able to catch a ride on GTA 6's coattails. I'm not saying gaming doesn't still face massive problems: the RAM crisis, the growth slowdown. There'll be more layoffs and studio closures, for sure. But it feels like big-ticket video games will have a different energy in 2027: buzzier, more crowded, more multifarious. It can't come soon enough.

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