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Grand Theft Auto V is already being tipped to be one the biggest games of all time, with first year sales over 20 million units, according to industry analysts.
Wedbush Securities’ Michael Pachter told GameInformer: “If GTA V gets mid-90 reviews, it’ll likely do 20-25 million in the first year. You have an install base two times [what it was] when GTA IV came out, and GTA 4 did 12 million in the first six months.”
EEDAR’s Jesse Divnich estimates sales in the same ballpark: “Currently, I project that if the game can maintain the exceptional level of quality of the past Grand Theft Autos and taking into consideration the increase in the install bases of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, Grand Theft Auto V should sell well over 24 million units worldwide in its first year.”
Divnich added: “Given the anticipation for the release, Grand Theft Auto V has the potential to shatter first day and first week sales records that are currently held by Call of Duty: Black Ops.”
Colin Sebastian of Baird Equity Research believes the game will reach lifetime sales surpassing $1.5 billion at retail and could en up “becoming one of the top 5 entertainment brands of all time.”
M2’s Billy Pidgeon believes the game will “easily exceed GTA IV 22M units sales,” whilst Mike Hickey of National Alliance Capital Markets points to Rockstar shipping “16.25 million units, for an estimated $746 million in sales for the Company’s fiscal ’13 operating period.”
Interestingly, many analysts are predicting a May/June summer release for GTA 5.
Check out some stills from the GTA 5 trailer in our GTA 5 trailer image gallery, and for more info gleamed from the trailer, head over to our in-depth GTA 5 trailer analysis.
The GTA 5 trailer was a real event not seen often in the video games industry, showing just how powerful the Grand Theft Auto franchise is. Sales in excess of 20 million don’t seem all that far fetched, especially given the huge increase in console install bases since the release of GTA 4.
