It's not because of the recession. They've been losing money since at least 2006 (I don't have the data for earlier fiscal years at hand).
Since that year, the only time they made a profit was in 2008 (GTA4 of course), but that profit wasn't enough to cover any of the losses in 2006/2007/2009, let alone the three together.
http://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ:TTWO&fstype=ii
My Mario Kart Wii friend code: 2707-1866-0957