Sullla said:
But see, that's exactly my point, shams. Guitar Hero 3 has sold 11m copies - by virtue of being on ALL platforms. Grand Theft Auto 4 is NOT going to be on two of the highest-selling platforms, Wii and PS2. To look more closely at those Guitar Hero 3 sales: That's... not even remotely close to 10m. Your Brawl example is similarly suspect reasoning (and I'm usually a huge fan of your posts, so please don't take any offense). While saying it sold 4m in two months is true, it's also rather disingenous, since Brawl is a front-loaded title like so many others. The opening week in America was 1.5m copies, and the first week in Japan sold 800k. We'll probably see another 2m units sold in those two territories by the end of the year, plus whatever Europe manages to contribute (another 2-3m?) That leaves us somewhere in the range of 8m units, which again is a great total - but not even remotely close to 13m. The biggest logical flaw is this statement: "Pretend the platform is doubled, and add Europe - and its an easy sell of 10m in just 2 months." Doubling the size of the install base doesn't add up to doubled sales, because as install bases grow they also become more diversified. If this were not the case, we should have expected to see the biggest PS2 games sell 5x the top games on the Gamecube and XBox, which clearly didn't happen. (Instead, they sold about 2x more, 15m compared to 7m). It's impossible to figure out the exact relationship between growing install base and growing sales, but it's certainly not a 1:1 ratio. I've yet to see anyone respond to my point that combining the top-selling lifetime 360 game plus the top-selling lifetime PS3 game still leaves you a good 2.5m copies short of 13m. |
There are multiple factors here at play in determining whether or not GTA IV can reach 13 Million within this 2008. When taking the top-selling 360 and the top-selling PS3 with the exception of Halo 3 last year, I dont think most of those games are real console movers. GTA IV has proven itself to move consoles, as such we can safely expect the number of consoles to increase and as such drive additional sales.
1. Are a lot of PS2 owners waiting for GTA IV to buy a PS3 or Xbox 360?
2. Does Microsoft cut the price of XBox 360 once GTA IV is released to grab those PS2 owners sitting on the sidelines?
3. Is multiplayer good enough to warrent people to keep the game instead of sending it back to gamestop?
If assuming all of these factors above are true, I think additional variables should be considered and therefore would be result in 2008 sales higher than 13 Million.
On a side note ...
Not sure if it is true, but is GTA IV being released in JP in April? IGN has it stated that it will be released there. I mean ... it aint gonna add much in sales, i think the most for lifetime might be 250-500k? but yeah, cause i havent heard anything bout it in the press or anywhere else except on IGN
