As reported by GrE, Michael Pachter, Gaming Research Analyst for Wedbush Morgan Securities said that Grand Theft Auto IV may be too large of a game to handle downloadable content as the majority of the game's owners never finish the main storyline.
"Ben's right that the DLC disappointed, but I suspect that the reason is that GTA games are so massive that a substantial majority of the GTA audience hasn't finished the core game, so they don't feel especially compelled to buy the DLC," Pachter said.
"GTA IV was at least a 50 hour game (for me, probably more like 100 hours), in contrast to the typical Call of Duty, which is a 6-10 hour game. Almost anyone who bought CoD finished it, and if they liked it (that's a high percentage), they were interested in DLC. On the other hand, my guess is that fewer than 20% of GTA owners finished the game (100% of VG247 readers, of course), so fewer were interested in DLC.
"I think that is a fair assessment, and don't think that the slow pace of DLC sales reflects poor performance for the franchise."
Pachter's statement comes in response to comments made earlier by AmTech analyst Ben Schachter who expressed "concern" over the state of the Grand Theft Auto franchise following poor sales of the game's most recent downloadable content.
31 Comments - Add comment