We’ve known forever now that Rockstar Games' most recent released inRed Dead Redemption 2was doing extremely well. The NPD Group reported a few days back thatRed Dead Redemption 2ended the calendar year 2018as the best-selling game. We’ve also known since early November thatshipments of the game had already reached 17 million, as well. Suffice to say, Rockstar Games had a winner on their hands.
Today, during Take-Two Interactive’s–the parent company of Rockstar–quarterly earnings call, it was revealed whereRed Dead Redemption 2now stands. According to Take-Two,Red Dead Redemption 2has now sold-in over 23 million copies of the game. As a reminder, sold-in means the number of copies shipped to retailers while sold-through means sales directly to consumers.
This means that since Take-Two’s previous report in November, the game has shipped out an additional 6 million units before the end of 2018. For a game that hasn’t even been on the market for 6 months yet, to already be nearing the 25 million threshold is outrageous.
What will be curious to see withRed Dead Redemption 2, in the long run, is whether or not it can sustain these numbers in the same way thatGrand Theft Auto Vhas been able to.GTA 5, which recentlypassed 100 million copies shipped, has been perhaps the single most impressive game of all-time purely in terms of sales. While I highly doubt thatRDR 2will have this same long tail, it is possible that sales for the game could continue to stay strong for quite awhile, especially afterRed Dead Onlineleaves its current beta form. Plus, a PC version arriving down the road seems quite possible as well and would continue to bolster sales.
Because of the success primarily ofRed Dead Redemption 2, Take-Two also reported strong financial results for the quarter as a whole. Net revenue for Take-Two was up drastically on the quarter at $1.249 billion, compared to the $480.8 million made in the previous year’s same quarter. As a result of this performance in the third quarter, Take-Two also raised its fiscal year projections as well.
We’ll keep an eye onRed Deadthroughout the year to continue to see how it performs. If you’d like to pick the game up now for yourself, it’s available on Xbox One and PS4.
