I don't know if its true but the silence at Take Two must be a worry.

 http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/5/is_gta_iv_take_two_s_savior_ttwo_

The game went on sale last Tuesday, amid a lot of breathless hype. But the market doesn't share the enthusiasm shared by gamers and game reviewers: TTWO is trading at just below $26. That's down about 1% for the day, and down 3% from where it opened Tuesday morning.

Take-Two could cheer investors up by releasing sales stats -- last fall, Microsoft (MSFT) was handing out sales data within two days of Halo 3's release -- but so far management has been mum.

Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter can't figure it out. “No sales numbers yet, again baffling," he tells us via e-mail: "One would think Take-Two wants to brag, but apparently that's not the case.”

So what's happening? You got us. The only thing we do know: Take-Two management doesn't just need to see good numbers out of GTA -- it needs to see fantastic numbers. Or else it's going to have a very hard time defending its decision to turn down Electronic Arts' (ERTS) $2 billion offer.

We should wait til ioi has had some time to let us know how much was sold but I'm interested in what you think. 

I think they want others to report on sales, which will be more credible. I wouldn't read too much into their silence.

I doubt they really know that much about the sales numbers, they will know what they shipped but not what has been sold.

MS was possibly only able to report because they buy full NPD numbers which would have quickly given them preliminary sell through results whereas I'm not sure if T2 buys them.

Just speculation of course.

Edit: Also from what I've seen and heard the early sales of GTAIV have not been underwhelming, the game has, at least early on, sold very well. Now we only have to wait and see if it has legs like its predecessors or whether its found a more focused fanbase like most big series end up having. 

well the game is a global sellout in 1 region...maybe NA sales are underwhelming?

T2 cant rely on only one AAA game to get them out of their financial woes no matter how big.They have to be a company who can consistently release good games and good selling games.

Preliminary data says the game has been selling well, but then again some of the estimates from the publisher were truly ridiculous, so maybe they're just not doing as well they thought they would?. The game was made by a very large team during a very long time, so GTA4 could be one of those games that need to sell something 5M+ just to break even.

This is based on absolutely nothing, and just one way to look at things. It might as well be that T2 wants to have final data before saying anything, or are trying to figure what colour the tie of the PR guy doing the bragging in their official press conference is going to be. =P

I'm sure they get an idea of how much is sold when there are request for more shipments.

Though they did ship a huge amount and if it's not close sold out at all, they may be in the dark.

Yes, GTA IV sales are disappointing.

I'm disappointed that it won't sell thirty million lifetime, but I'll live with 15-20 million.

See! I'm disappointed in GTAIV sales.

How the fuck is there a thread about this, seriously. GTA4 selling badly? About as likely as.. something unlikely.