http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=23172

Is it a poor profit proposition to release an M-rated DS title? EEDAR analyst Jesse Divnich thinks so, estimating that GTA: Chinatown Wars sold only 200,000 units in March, less than many expected.

"It appears the industry may have been over-zealous with initial expectations on how GTA: Chinatown Wars would perform based upon the news it had received one of the highest quality scores for a Nintendo DS title," says Divnich.

Quality scores alone don't seem to be a major driver of sales on the DS, says Divnich -- he says many other DS titles, irrespective of their ESRB ratings, have scored 90 and above on Metacritic and have never broken 300,000 units in 3 months in North America.

"The results from Chinatown are an important benchmark for the industry, as it will be the best-performing mature rated title on the Nintendo DS to date coupled with one of the strongest mature-rated game brands," says Divnich.

Although GTA IV will likely post a profit for publisher Take-Two, says the analyst, there's an "elevated risk" for other publishers looking to go mature on Nintendo's portable.

"With the majority of publishers currently taking a risk-adverse stance, we expect this to slow the growth rate of future mature rated titles on the DS," he says.

By contrast, though, titles targeted at the M demographic can still thrive on the PSP. "Previous GTA titles on the PSP have sold in excess 1 million units lifetime," Divnich says. "The performance on the DS highlights clearly the demographic differences between the two platforms in the handheld market."

Few DS games can get a million in a couple of weeks. Chinatown is going to do well (at least on the VG chartz is getting a stable position) and probably get a million, but if people were actually expecting big and fast sales that is not going to happen.

He ESTIMATED that GTA:CW sold 200k in March.

I didn't realize games have to sell 1 million in a week to be successful nowadays. He should know that GTA titles have long legs over time, look at San Andreas.

Vice city stories on psp sold worse then gta: chinatown wars. Why doesn't anyone complain about that?
Stop blaiming Nintendo for everything! What's next? Nintendo caused WW1 and2?

Ehm... how many M titles are there on the DS??

btw.. ChinaTown Wars is great!! I actually finished a GTA!! Most of the time I get bored with them but not this time!

It just shows how "much" analysts know.

People like to see quick sales, even if it is not something that generally happens.

Mike from Morgantown

haha what a tool.

I only found out the game was out three days ago so I picked it up.

if no one advertises it takes tie for word of mouth to spread about a game. GTA will have long legs.

If GTA: CW reach 1M along the year, I want to know wich excuse this ANALyst will give.

Hes just like the retarded fanboys on this site who were saying it flopped. Like people keep telling them here, you have to wait another month or so to see its legs.

So that guy is supposed to have credibility?