Analyst: GTA V Likely for Fiscal 2012

An analyst watching the video game industry has predicted that Gran Theft Auto V from developer Rockstar and publisher Take Two will likely arrive during the 2012 fiscal year, which is set to run from April 2012 until the end of March 2013.

Mike Hickey, who works with Janco Partners, has issues an analyst note which talks about Take Two's recent move to shift the end of its fiscal year to March 31 and looks at the next two years for the video game publisher.

Hickey believes that during the next fiscal year the two big titles for Take Two will be L.A. Noire, the detective story set in Los Angeles which is created by Team Bondi under the supervision of Rockstar, and Max Payne 3, the long awaited sequel in the shooter series, which has been delayed after being initially set to arrive in late 2010.

The analyst also thinks Duke Nukem Forever might be a modest hit during the same period, with the company managing to stay profitable even if it does not release a GTA game or a Red Dead Redemption title.

Hickey says that GTA V will be a blockbuster when it is released, presumably in 2012, managing to move more than 16 million copies and generate about 750 million dollars in revenue for Take Two.

The same fiscal period will also see the launch of BioShock Infinite from Irrational Games, a title that is predicted to sell more than 4 million copies and bring in more than 180 million in sales.

GTA V will be one of the titles which will benefit from the increase in sales currently seen by the Xbox 360 home console from Microsoft, which could have an install base of more than 40 million units by the end of this year and significantly more than that in 2012.

Take Two has not confirmed that a new GTA is in development.