Plenty of folks in their right mind are buying AAA games at launch. Being in the zeitgeist, and talking with other folks when they also experienced the same creative work, has value. It's the same reason folks see movies in the theater instead of waiting for streaming or a boxed release.

The $80 launch price is to target the brazillions of gamers who literally only buy GTA, COD, and Sports Game every year. Easy to justify spending a lot of money on a game when it's the only game you play.

I buy many at launch, and sell them a few weeks later with a small loss. Not going do that with GTA 6 as there is no disc version, so I’ll wait for a discount. Plenty of other things to play.