Grand Theft Auto V poised for $1B in sales
SAN FRANCISCO — Grand Theft Auto V, the video game featuring gangsters swimming with sharks, is forecast to generate $1 billion US in sales in one month, four times the amount Take-Two Interactive Software Inc. spent to make it.
The title, five years in the making, cost as much as $250 million to develop and market, according to Sterne Agee & Leach Inc. It hit stores Tuesday and may top the $900-million debut of its record-setting predecessor, estimates Colin Sebastian, an analyst with Robert W. Baird & Co.
“There’s a lot of anticipation for this game,” Sebastian said. “If the sell-through is disappointing at all, because it doesn’t break records or fit some other point of measurement, then it reflects on the broader industry’s fortunes.”
The pressure is on game publishers to prove $60 titles that take years to build have a future in an industry shaken by cheap titles for Facebook, tablets and smartphones. Since the last Grand Theft Auto broke opening-day records i n 2008, developers have cut jobs and slashed the number of titles they make, moving content online as they seek to avoid the fate of weaker players such as THQ Inc., which went bankrupt.
Retail sales of new video game software fell 15 per cent to $2.15 billion in the first half of the year, to make up 33 per cent of U.S. consumer spending on games, according to researcher NPD Group. Digital-format sales, including online subscriptions and downloads, mobile and social titles, rose 10 per cent.
As new consoles arrive from Sony Corp. and Microsoft Corp., the holiday season is a test for big, packaged-game franchises like Grand Theft Auto, Activision Blizzard Inc.’s Call of Duty and Battlefield from Electronic Arts Inc.
Order activity suggests Grand Theft Auto V shipments could exceed Wall Street’s estimates for the year ending in March and bode well for holiday releases, said Sebastian, the Baird analyst. Take-Two profit, excluding some items, is forecast to rise almost sevenfold this year to $2.47 a share, the average of 16 analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.