Why GTA Online San Andreas Mercenaries is unlikely to be the final DLC update

Many GTA Online players often wonder what the final DLC update for this title will be. However, there is no indication that San Andreas Mercenaries is the last one. For starters, Rockstar Games never confirmed or hinted at it being the final major patch. Plus, it would only make sense for this studio to offer some sort of announcement if that was the case since GTA Online has generated a ton of money over nearly a decade.

Moreover, big updates help keep the game fresh. GTA Online needs those to continue incentivizing players to spend money. Anybody who looks at Take-Two Interactive's Earnings Calls should know that this multiplayer offering is usually listed as one of the first contributors to the company's net bookings. More details regarding this can be found below.

Note: Some aspects of this article are subjective.

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GTA Online San Andreas Mercenaries is most likely not the final DLC update

There is a good chance that a new DLC will be announced after this one (Image via Rockstar Games)

Here is a reference to the previous statement from Take-Two Interactive's Q4 2023 Earnings Call regarding GTA Online's success:

"Net Bookings from recurrent consumer spending grew 115% and accounted for 78% of total Net Bookings. Digitally-delivered Net Bookings were up 76% to $1.35 billion, as compared to $765.8 million in last year's fiscal fourth quarter, and accounted for 97% of total Net Bookings. The largest contributors to Net Bookings were NBA 2K23; Grand Theft Auto Online and Grand Theft Auto V."

The massive success of Grand Theft Auto Online means it's financially smart to keep this game running (as a title in maintenance mode wouldn't generate as much revenue). Big DLC updates help it from getting stale, not to mention GTA+ is a fairly young service that relies on people to pay for it.

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Popularity of GTA Online: San Andreas Mercenaries

The closest data to gauge how many gamers play this title on PC (Image via Steamcharts)

As official figures related to this title aren't available publicly, the closest metric to gauge its popularity would be through Steamcharts. Unfortunately, GTA Online doesn't have one for itself, as the game technically counts as Grand Theft Auto 5. That means some of the numbers shown above are for both the single-player offering and its multiplayer counterpart.

Steamcharts is consistent in representing that big updates usually show an increase in the number of average players. For example, San Andreas Mercenaries came out in June 2023, and the average player count increased by a few dozen thousand. The same thing happened in December 2022 with Los Santos Drug Wars.

How the game originally faired on Steamcharts during its debuting months (Image via Steamcharts)

Steamcharts only represents PC data, so consoles would add an additional playerbase to this estimation. Note that Grand Theft Auto 5's Steamcharts' numbers were much, much lower a few months after that game's release when GTA Online didn't have any remarkable pieces of content to offer. This is evident in the above image.

This multiplayer title is still popular, so seeing more big DLC updates after the San Andreas Mercenaries update would only be reasonable. It is worth mentioning that Grand Theft Auto 6 hasn't even been formally announced yet. Thus, it's not like players have a potential sequel that could replace Grand Theft Auto 5 Online just yet.

The latter game is approaching its 10-year anniversary. So it would be poetic if Rockstar Games announced something significant for this occasion during the San Andreas Mercenaries DLC.