Take-Two Interactive told investors that Red Dead Redemption 2 achieved its highest level of annual unit sales since its launch year and has sold over 85 million units to date, a striking result for a title Rockstar largely moved away from three years ago. The company’s chief executive, Strauss Zelnick, framed the milestone during the recent earnings call as proof of the game’s unexpected staying power.
“Rockstar Games' Red Dead Redemption 2 achieved its highest level of annual unit sales since its launch year, with over 85 million units sold to date,” Zelnick said, tallying a figure that places the game among the very best-selling titles ever — the third best-selling game of all time, Take-Two added. Chief financial officer Lainie Goldstein credited that outcome in part to franchises across the publisher, saying simply: "Better than expected performance."
The numbers landed in a short, specific moment: Take-Two’s recent earnings call. They matter because they show a game that has spent years with comparatively little attention from its developer still driving significant sales, even as other live services get the bulk of Rockstar’s resources. Zelnick described that split plainly, calling GTA Online a "live service business" and Red Dead Online a "legacy live service," language that signals how the company sees the two multiplayer worlds moving forward.
That context is crucial. Rockstar announced in 2022 that it was winding down updates for Red Dead Redemption 2, a move that usually signals a title is no longer a priority for sustained development. Yet Red Dead Online resurfaced with new content in 2025 — an update that added new missions, zombies and robots — and the sales spike reported now shows the franchise continuing to convert interest into purchases despite the developer pulling back most ongoing support.
The friction is obvious: record annual sales for a game people were told was being phased out. Zelnick managed that contradiction on the call by arguing resilience and quality, saying GTA Online and Red Dead Redemption 2 "have proven to be vastly more resilient than anyone expected, and I think it's a reflection of the quality of the work that Rockstar has done." But the company’s own categorization of Red Dead Online as a legacy service points to limits on how much new investment fans should expect.
For players and the market, the immediate takeaway is blunt. Red Dead Redemption 2’s sales performance shows a depth of demand that outlived Rockstar’s core focus, but Take-Two’s language and Rockstar’s earlier 2022 decision make it unlikely the game will move back into the center of the studio’s live-service strategy. The 2025 update proved the title can still receive attention, but Take-Two’s framing suggests those interventions will be occasional rather than sustained.
Put another way: the record sales answer the obvious question of whether Red Dead Redemption 2 still matters — yes — and the company’s own words answer the next one of whether that will change Rockstar’s priorities — no. The game’s commercial endurance looks set to keep it on leaderboards and in catalog sales for years, but as a legacy property rather than an active live-service focus, according to Take-Two’s executives.
