‘GTA5’ Now Best-Selling Game Of All Time In The USA As ‘GTA Online’ Continues Raking In Money
There is still no sign of Grand Theft Auto 5 slowing down four years after launch. Publisher Take-Two Interactive announced the GTA Online portion of the PS4, Xbox One, and PC title is still breaking records during an earnings call Tuesday as it has become the all-time bestselling video game in the United States.
Grand Theft Auto 5 has sold more than 85 million copies since its release in 2013, according to Take-Two via Seeking Alpha. Additionally, the title has appeared on the list of top 10 games sold in 42 of the last 50 months.
While Tetris and Minecraft still hold the top spots for games sold worldwide, sales of GTA5 are none the less impressive and are largely thanks to the sustained success of GTA Online. Take-Two expected to see microtransaction revenue from GTA Online but saw another record quarter that exceeded expectations and was the publisher’s single largest contributor to recurrent consumer spending. The company now expects growth in the game to continue during its 2018 fiscal year.
Exact numbers were not provided by Take-Two related to GTA5 sales. However, the company earned $577 million during its second quarter with $356 million coming from digital sales. Take-Two expects its third-quarter earnings to reach $610 million to $620 million with GTA Online and GTA5 being the largest contributors to growth.
Rockstar Games was singled out as delivering 45 percent of earnings from all the labels under Take-Two. 50 percent is expected to come from 2K Games, which has titles like NBA 2K and WWE 2K18 as the largest drivers of income.
GTA Online fans can expect Rockstar Games to continue to deliver updates like Smuggler’s Run, the dogfight mode, and more. Take-Two CEO Strauss H. Zelnick explained there’s still a significant community who love GTA5‘s multiplayer mode and implies the content will continue to be released as long as the money continues to flow in.
This obviously has an impact on the upcoming Red Dead Redemption 2 as Zelnick’s comments on what Take-Two learned from GTA Online makes clear.
“One of the things that we learned is, if we create a robust opportunity and a robust world in which people can play delightfully in a bigger and bigger way that they will keep coming back and they will engage and if there is an opportunity to monetize that engagement.”
Red Dead Redemption 2 is currently expected to be released between April and June 2018 with online play included as a major component. It appears as if the online component will be separate from the main campaign like GTA5 as Take-Two Interactive registered a “reddead.online” internet domain last year, as Inquisitr reported.
Rockstar Games only recently began explaining the Red Dead Redemption 2 setting and characters. How the studio attempts to recreate the success of GTA Online in the wild west will be of keen interest.
[Featured Image by Rockstar Games]
