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'Grand Theft' Video Game Scores 6 Million Sales In First Week

Image from Rockstar Games

'Grand Theft Auto IV' takes gamers into a gritty urban world.

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By ROMMIE JOHNSON | The Tampa Tribune
and RICHARD MULLINS | The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 9, 2008

When you're selling "Grand Theft Auto," who needs advertising?

The richly realistic video game that lets players steal cars, shoot police and snuff out passing prostitutes has achieved a status many companies can only dream of — the product that sells itself.

Released on April 29, "GTA IV" sold 6 million copies in the first week, generating an estimated $500 million in retail sales for its publisher, Rockstar Games, with $310 million in the first 24 hours, the company said. That trounces some of the biggest entertainment launches, including the latest Harry Potter book and Spider-Man movie.

Nearly every teenage boy in the nation has probably heard of the game or wants to buy it already, say game experts, and those numbers are adding up fast.

It also means "GTA IV" topped last year's record-breaking $300 million first-week sales of Microsoft and Bungee Studios' first-person shooter video game "Halo 3." And "Halo 3" benefited from a broad marketing blitz that included special "Halo 3" Doritos, "Halo 3" Slurpees and a "Halo 3" NASCAR race car.

"'Grand Theft Auto' has absolutely rabid followers who will buy the next version of [the game] no matter what," said Rick Hall, a professor in the Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy at the University of Central Florida. And, in this case, the game appeals to the stereotypical fanatical fan of violent video games.

"This is really the 13- to 18-year-old, white, middle-class male player," Hall said.

That's providing powerful lessons to marketers of video games and youth products of any sort.

Lesson No. 1 may be: Violence still sells well. Lesson No. 2 may be: When your product is a runaway success, it's best not to get in the way.

It's Designed For Hardcore Fans

Many new video games hope to attract casual players, those who might pick up a game as an occasional diversion. The Nintendo Wii, for example, was designed to appeal beyond the typical young, male demographic of game fans — and found success even with nursing home residents playing bowling games.

"Grand Theft Auto" is not that kind of game.

The latest version was geared to appeal to the hardcore gamer, and that has benefited Rockstar.

Broad, mass-market advertising has been scant. That was a smart strategy, says Jason Cieslak, managing director of the brand consulting agency Siegel+Gale.

"Grand Theft's" producers get two benefits simultaneously, Cieslak said.

The game's producers avoided heavy advertising spending. And they're less likely to provoke more criticisms from members of Congress or parent groups concerned about adult and violent themes in video games.

"It may be some time before some observers find some extra nasty aspect that gets them back in the spotlight, but perhaps the game makers are hoping that's $500 million down the road," Cieslak said.

Also, a broad advertising campaign might degrade the "street cred" of the game, Cieslak said. Gamers relish the underground, forbidden tone of the game, so it wouldn't do well to advertise during the evening news or in between commercials for Pantene shampoo and GEICO insurance, Cieslak said.

The makers of "Grand Theft" also avoided the popular practice of strategically leaking previews of the game to a large number of game reviewers. Instead, they took a much more secretive route and kept details and images of the game under wraps until nearly a week before the launch.

They also were willing to forego another hot trend in video gaming — selling advertising or product placement space within a game. Those kinds of ads appear in places such as virtual billboards or even the drinks that game characters chug down.

Instead, game producers manufactured whole lines of made-up products. For instance, "Grand Theft" includes Sprunk soda (loosely based on Sprite) and Weazel News (a take-off on Fox News). Those came complete with real-life merchandise such as Sprunk cola T-shirts that fans can buy.

That gave the target demographic of 13-18 year olds something exclusive and secretive that they could wear to school that only other "Grand Theft Auto" insiders would recognize.

All this stands in stark contrast to last year's hottest video game, "Halo 3," backed by Microsoft Corp., which flexed tens of millions of dollars in marketing muscle. With "Halo 3," Microsoft launched the game as if it were a Hollywood film.

The strategy worked well for Microsoft, generating $170 million in sales in the game's first 24 hours of release, with roughly 2.5 million units sold.

Game Has Great Reviews

Microsoft's heavy marketing of "Halo 3" makes the under-the-radar sales success of "Grand Theft" more extraordinary, marketers say. It also helps that the game is getting stellar reviews.

More than two dozen prominent game reviewers gave it exceptionally high ratings. And in some ways the game is setting new standards for creativity.

Amid the controversy, it's often overlooked that the "Grand Theft Auto" franchise achieved iconic status not because of its over-the-top violence or sexual content, but because of its revolutionary structure.

When "Grand Theft Auto III" was released in 2001, most video games required players to "win" by progressing from start to finish along a linear path. "Grand Theft," on the other hand, was more open-ended and gave players a greater sense of free will, allowing them to roam freely while exploring and interacting with the game's expansive metropolis however they see fit.

"Grand Theft" further refines the series' signature "sandbox" style of play — so-called because it has no pre-set script and relies instead on the player's imagination.

"That's what's great about it — it has a great deal of depth," says Christian Crider, 24, of Tampa. "You play 'Halo 2' for 24 hours and you're done — there's nothing else to explore."

Crider, who's been playing video games for about 15 years and now writes about them for Tampa-based REAX Magazine, a monthly entertainment journal, says he normally tries "not to buy into the hype, because most games fail to deliver," but also says, "I was ready for ["Grand Theft Auto IV"] — I bought it on Day One."

As a writer, Crider says he most appreciates the game's social satire, but acknowledges that it's the open-ended game play that sets it apart.

"You have a lot of choice — not in the sense that role-playing games have choice, but in a 'sandbox' way. You can choose to drive your car into a crowd of people or you can choose to drive normally," he said. "It's up to you what you do, which makes it different from the linear types of games that you see most of the time, including 'Halo.'"

In between missions that advance the plot, players can indulge their whims in the game's vibrant world. While that can be as innocuous as using the in-game Internet to find a date or shooting pool with a buddy, players can also go on a blood-thirsty rampage for no reason beyond the spectacle itself. It's when that unscripted play veers toward the violent that the game attracts controversy.

Even then, "Grand Theft" benefits, says Hall of UCF, because in the world of video games, there's "acceptable" and "controversial" violence.

There are highly realistic war-themed video games that allow players to blaze down enemy soldiers. And there are futuristic games where players kill as many aliens as possible. But those games rarely attract criticism because they are somehow "fantasy" or "historic," Hall said.

"As soon as you have some Senator saying 'This game will destroy the minds of America's youth,'" Hall said, "you can almost guarantee that every youth who can get their hands on the game will buy it."

Reporter Richard Mullins can be reached at (813) 259-7919 or rmullins@tampatrib.com. Rommie Johnson can be reached at (813) 259-7426 or rdjohnson@tampatrib.com.

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