Last month Rockstar set the gaming world — and lots of virtual police cars — on fire with the release of Grand Theft Auto V, the game that made $1 billion in a weekend. USA Today shared the NPD Group’s video game sales report for September on Friday and revealed that after months of subpar results, overall retail sales were up 27% from August. These improved sales were mostly thanks to GTA V, which accounted for more than half of all game sales revenues on the month. “Grand Theft Auto represented over 50% of dollar sales in September, and had the highest first month sales than any other previous launch in the Grand Theft Auto franchise,” said NPD analyst Liam Callahan.
This follows a slight uptick for sales in August, making for a rare two positive months in a row for the industry. Unsurprisingly, hardware sales continue to slide as gamers save up for the next offerings from Microsoft and Sony, but as we reported on Friday, the PS3 did finally overtake the Xbox 360 thanks to a special offer that bundled Grand Theft Auto V with the PS3 Super Slim. Although the unmatched sales of Grand Theft Auto V have skewed the numbers significantly, huge numbers like these are good for everyone in the industry, especially leading into the console launch month of November.
