Take-Two’s CEO has hit back after some fans complained about the high price of the recently announced Red Dead Redemption port for Nintendo Switch.

Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick has defended the high price of its upcoming Red Dead Redemption port for Nintendo Switch. Some gamers are outraged by what they say is the exorbitant price of the ageing title. The Switch port of Rockstar’s classic open-world western was announced earlier this week. Before that, speculation had been rife for months about a possible RDR remaster.

In Red Dead Redemption, initially released in 2010 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, Rockstar took its open-world experience from the Grand Theft Auto franchise and adapted it to a Wild West setting.

Despite long-standing calls for a complete remaster of the fan-favourite title, Rockstar announced earlier this week that RDR would be ported to Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 instead.

While the PS4 and Switch ports of the game will finally give players of those systems a chance to get their hands on Rockstar’s beloved Old West title, many gamers have expressed disappointment at the high price of the ports. With a price tag of $50, only slightly cheaper than most new console releases, the expensive port of the acclaimed but ageing title has been seen as a money grab by some disgruntled gamers. In a statement to IGN in response to these complaints, Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick said, “This is just the price we think is commercially fair”.

The often controversial and always outspoken Take-Two CEO was supported by the company’s CFO, Hannah Sage. The latter noted that the ports would come with the Undead Nightmare add-on. This was previously released as a standalone title. It includes both the base game and the zombie-filled expansion for less than the price of most new releases. But many players are still frustrated by the high price tag.

Adding to the frustration, Red Dead Redemption ports also lack multiplayer functionality and the ability to play in 4K resolution, even though Xbox Series X owners have enjoyed the latter for years.

Zelnick claims that the RDR Switch release is “certainly a great value for consumers”. But it’s clear that a significant proportion of consumers see things very differently. The surprisingly high price of the ports has caused a severe backlash. Given this, some gamers might simply skip the re-release. (Perhaps they’d rather buy the Xbox version on the cheap. Backwards compatibility has been solved there. On modern machines with 4K TVs, RDR is still beautiful…)

Source: IGN