Red Dead Redemption ships 8 million
Helps Take Two back into profit.
Rockstar's rootin' tootin' western epic Red Dead Redemption has now shipped nearly eight million copies since its launch earlier this year, helping publisher Take Two back into its bank manager's good books.
According to its quarterly financial report out today, net revenue was up 65 per cent year-on-year to $1.16 billion, with net profits coming in at a tidy $42.6 million.
This time last year it was looking at a net loss of $140.5 million so unsurprisingly CEO Ben Feder was pretty pleased with himself.
"We have achieved our goal of profitability in a year without a new release of Grand Theft Auto," he boasted.
"Our better-than-expected revenue growth and margin expansion were driven by strong demand for our diverse portfolio of games, including the hit new titles Red Dead Redemption and NBA 2K11, as well as strong sales of catalog titles and digitally delivered content. I am also pleased to report that our 2K Sports division was profitable during the period."
Take Two chairman Strauss Zelnick went on to outline the publisher's plan to extend that purple patch into 2011. "We plan to build on the talents of our world-class creative team to deliver an increasingly diverse portfolio of high-quality titles."
He's no doubt referring to L.A. Noire, Top Spin 4, Major League Baseball 2K11, Duke Nukem Forever, Spec Ops: The Line, XCOM and BioShock Infinite, all currently in various stages of development
"We will also pursue opportunities to enter newer areas of the interactive entertainment business," he continued, "such as digitally delivered content and the expanding Asian and Latin American markets."