So GTA V never came to the Switch...

[javi741]

It's hard to say the definitive reason why GTA 5 isn't on Switch. We have to remember though that the people behind the decision to release GTA 5 or not likely aren't as logical or have as much knowledge regarding the Switch. For the most part the people in Take-Two & Rockstar are most likely solely focus on PS & Xbox and always disregarded Nintendo as a legit console maker for their 3rd party games with most of Rockstar's games skipping out on Nintendo platforms even when successful.

For previous Nintendo consoles, likely the biggest reason why Rockstar always skipped out is likely due to hardware limitations, the lower sales numbers they either seen for themselves or by other developers on Nintendo platforms, and the image surrounding Nintendo as being the more family-friendly console that appeals to gamers who don't care play mature games on an underpowered Nintendo console. The Gamecube dealt with not only suffering with hardware limitations with small discs for GTA to fit, but also sold poorly and had a very bad childish image at the time for Rockstar to take seriously and think it could sell well, same goes for the Wii & Wii U.

Even though the Switch has been breaking some of those previous norms we've seen with mature games on previous Nintendo platforms. With Nintendo receiving more mature games and showing pretty good results & the Switch being powerful enough to handle the 360 version of GTA 5. It's likely that Rockstar/Take Two still isn't seeing that opportunity there based on their previous history with Nintendo platforms. I'm surprised at the amount of people I see on the internet who firmly believe that "Switch can't handle GTA 5" even though that's false since it was made on systems less powerful than the Switch, and I wouldn't be surprised if Rockstar/Take-Two employees think the same thing because they may have forgotten that the 360 version of GTA5 exists and that the Switch is more powerful. And like other people said they might be scared to deal with Nintendo's poor online service since GTA Online is Rockstar's biggest priority with GTA rn. And maybe they might not have enough faith GTA 5 will do well on Switch despite the high install base cause its possible they might still have a stigma towards Nintendo of being a platform that doesn't care about mature games. While yes they did release GTA Trilogy on Switch its likely a far lower-budget game that Rockstar would be willing to risk release and its a more story mode-oriented game that tends to do better on Switch.

A key example I could give that shows the stigma for developers in making mature games for a Nintendo platform is when Mortal Kombat 11 was about to release on Switch, I think I heard some story about a developer showing it off to Nintendo and asking "Are you sure you're ok with putting this mature game on Switch?" which is crazy to ask in 2019 when Nintendo long stopped restricting mature games on their platforms for 20+ years now, but a lot of these developers don't know how Nintendo platforms are like.

I'd still like to see GTA 5 come to Switch, but I feel like it's already getting too late for that at this point. The Switch is on the latter half of its lifecycle and GTA5 while still big, Rockstar will soon transition to GTA6. I feel like if GTA5 were to come to switch it would've happened by now.