Palworld community manager points to a new problem with GTA 6’s delay: ‘Expect to see many games swerve to avoid the 2027 awards season’

If you feel like we’ve been here before, then well done for being perceptive because we have. Rockstar announced yesterday that GTA 6 was getting delayed again, and is now scheduled for November 19, which seems like an eternity away.

As you can imagine, GTA 6 fans have been reacting really normally to this news. No, I’m serious, after the last delay, it seems like everyone went through all the stages of grief and has reached acceptance, or near enough: “Nothing wrong with delaying a game. Nothing at all. But why keep giving dates with so much confidence when they know it needs more time to polish?”

But among fans trying to rationalise another delay, there are others within the gaming industry sharing support, thinly-veiled threats, and even some theories about the breaking GTA 6 news.

“Interestingly, just a little industry knowledge for all you gamers, a Nov 19 launch puts them outside the nomination window for most game awards in 2026,” Palworld’s communications director, Bucky, says in a social media post. “Intentional or…? Either way, expect to see many games (especially AAA ones) swerve to avoid the 2027 awards season.”

I’m not convinced that the delay has anything to do with falling outside the 2026 game awards schedule, although I wouldn’t want to go up against Mewgenics in a fight. But the fact that GTA 6 will now likely fall into the 2027 awards window will likely cause more damage than good.

It was already clear that everyone wanted to keep clear of GTA 6’s launch, well, all except for Devolver, but go off I guess. But GTA 6 won’t just have a monopoly on people’s time and wallets, but also the awards season. It’s going to be like Baldur’s Gate 3 all over again, god help our souls.

The fact that it’ll likely be very hard for any other game to top GTA 6 during awards may well have factored into launch plans. So yeah, this delay has just widened the net of other games getting messed up by GTA 6, and it’ll likely happen all over again when Rockstar finally gets around to releasing GTA 6 on PC, whenever that will be.