GTA V Becomes Most Profitable Entertainment Product of All Time

Grand Theft Auto V has reportedly become the most profitable media product of all time, soaring above other games and even movies like Avatar.

Considering how long the game has held a position in various top sales charts for years since it was released back in September of 2013, it's not difficult to imagine that Rockstar Games' most recent Grand Theft Auto game is having no problems bringing in the earnings for Rockstar and Take-Two Interactive. But according to MarketWatch, the game absolutely dwarfs other profitable media products like the Star Wars movies and the Call of Duty series.

From looking at the infographic that was created by MarketWatch to show just how far ahead GTA V is when compared to other games and movies, James Cameron's Avatar didn't come close to GTA V's profits. While the movie's gross earnings were reported to be $2.8 billion by MarketWatch, GTA V towers over that number with a reported $6 billion in revenue. The two products had a comparable budget within a few million dollars as well.

These profits for Take-Two's game come from over 90 billion units being sold since the game was released years ago. While the report from MarketWatch doesn't indicate whether microtransactions were factored into the figures, Cowen analyst Doug Creutz said that even if the biggest movies' other sources of income like DVDs and streaming sales were factored into the numbers, the movies still wouldn't even come close to what GTA V has accomplished.

"I think it's a wild outlier," Creutz told MarketWatch. "I think maybe with the exception something Nintendo has made — Mario Brothers — but aside from that there's never been a console game that's sold so many units."

Looking at the video games instead of movies, one of the closest series that could hope to contend with Grand Theft Auto's profits is the Call of Duty series. While totaling up the profits from each Call of Duty game would be enough to beat Rockstar's latest installation in the series, the individual Call of Duty games don't come close to GTA V in terms of units sold either. Compared to GTA V's 90 million units, MarketWatch's infographic shows that the closest Call of Duty game behind that is Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 with 26.5 million units sold. Next in line is Call of Duty: Black ops with 24.2 million units sold.

The game's online component, GTA Online, is no doubt a driving factor in the sales. Judging from the profits GTA V has earned and the fact that it shows up frequently in the top sales spots, it doesn't look like it's going to fall out of gamers' favor anytime soon.

[MarketWatch]