GTA V Sells 185M Copies But Take-Two Incurs Losses

On August 8, Take-Two Interactive shared a report unveiling its financial results for the first quarter of the 2024 fiscal year, covering the period from April to June 2023.

First, sales for the quarter increased by 20% compared to the same period last year, and the company's revenue increased by 17%, reaching $1.28 billion. The majority of sales came from microtransactions, accounting for 84% of the total amount, which is over a billion dollars (the share of microtransactions has grown by 38% over the year).

As for the company's main revenue drivers, money was mostly generated by NBA 2K23, GTA V, GTA Online, hyper-casual games from Zynga (Empires & Puzzles, Toon Blast, Words With Friends), Red Dead Redemption 2, and Red Dead Redemption Online. The report did not mention the success of LEGO 2K Drive, which was released this quarter so it appears the title didn't have the expected result. 

Take-Two continues to incur losses, which almost doubled compared to the first quarter of the 2023 fiscal year. The company lost $206 million compared to $104 million in the previous year. The report notes that the trend of revenue and sales growth alongside losses has been seen at Take-Two for about a year. 

When it comes to the company's flagship title, the sales of GTA V increased by another five million copies in three months, reaching 185 million copies. The total number of copies sold for the Grand Theft Auto series reached 405 million. Another Rockstar game, Red Dead Redemption 2, sold 55 million copies, adding two million copies in the quarter. The total sales for the Red Dead Redemption franchise reached 79 million copies.

The NBA games series sold a total of 140 million copies with NBA 2K23 becoming the second best-selling game in the series, second only to NBA 2K20. The report also mentioned the total sales of Borderlands 3 which reached 18 million copies with the sales of all games in the franchise now amounting to 81 million.

To sum things up, Take-Two said they expect to continue incurring losses in the current year. The company's internal forecasts predicted it will lose over half a billion dollars by the end of the 2024 fiscal year, ranging from $501 to $545 million. Take-Two is sure though that the next fiscal year should be particularly significant, calling it a "turning point" for their business.

The publisher expects total sales of $8 billion in the 2025 fiscal year (from April 2024 to March 2025 calendar year). The current year forecast is $5.5 billion. Take-Two says the expected growth is connected with a "major lineup of releases" without specifying the titles that will be released during this period. 

You can find the full report here. Previously, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said he thinks Red Dead Redemption port price is 'commercially accurate'. Learn more here. Also, don't forget to join our 80 Level Talent platform and our Telegram channel, follow us on Threads, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.