Microsoft Playing up GTA IV Impact on Console Sales

Microsoft is clearly trying to pull out the numbers to prove just how much the Xbox 360 is growing, now that the "killer app" that is Grand Theft Auto IV has been launched. The company is now claiming that 40% of the new Xbox sales within the first week of GTA IV's launch have been bundled with the game.

A recent statement from Microsoft also says that 60% of the sales of the gang life game were for the Xbox 360, with only 40% going to the PlayStation 3. Even earlier than that, Microsoft was quoted as saying that the Xbox 360 version of GTA IV was outselling the PS3 version by two to one. Either the numbers are changing very, very quickly or Microsoft is really trying hard to spin this as hard as it can in favor of its own console, the same console that has been lately beaten in the sales charts by the Sony-created rival.

A spokesperson was quoted by Major Nelson, a known source of news on the Xbox front, as saying that "The game is attaching well to new consoles, roughly 40 per cent of 360s going out the door had a copy of GTA IV going with them". The game is set to have driven up Xbox 360 overall sales by 54%, when numbers are compared to the prior week of release.

Numbers coming from the Chart Track company in the UK tell us that 514,000 units of GTA IV were chalked up to the Xbox 360 during the first week. In the same time frame, the PS3 could only boast of sales of 413,000.

The number showing comes just as Microsoft and Sony are engaged in another "war of words" regarding the success of their consoles on the European market. After David Reeves from Sony declared that the PS3 has outsold the Xbox 360 in absolute numbers in Europe, Microsoft has fired back by claiming that those numbers were not even real and that the Xbox is the console of choice for European gamers.

If GTA IV leads to a big growth in Xbox 360 sales, then Microsoft can claim it has the better console, thus justifying the millions it is set to dish out to Rockstar for the exclusive downloadable content that could come as early as August. On the other hand, if the PlayStation 3 version of the game sells in numbers close to the Xbox 360 version, Sony is going to say that the only reason for the success of the Microsoft console, limited as it is, is the massive marketing campaign topped with the promise of DLC.

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