I’ll admit it right away – I love playing video games. There’s nothing quite like sitting down and delving into a brand-spankin-new game that’s been super hyped up by the gaming community. Sure, I get the occasional eye-roll or sarcastic comment from my girlfriend or parents, but so be it. Video games rule! But for those of you out there who have very little to no interest in playing video games, hear this: the video game industry is booming and top-selling games are selling well enough to compete with Hollywood’s biggest box office hits.
Click photo for the official Call of Duty MW2 trailer
Apparently targeting nerds of all ages isn’t such a bad idea. Games like Grand Theft Auto: IV, Halo Reach, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 are setting some impressive records that look pretty similar to Hollywood blockbusters like The Dark Knight or the Harry Potter films. When Grand Theft Auto: IV was released, it sold more than $310 million in the first 24 hours it was out. In the first five days of it’s release, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 made $550 million and eventually went on to reach $1 billion worldwide. Plus, an article from GamerLive.TV reported that the U.S. video game industry made $19.66 billion in revenue in 2009 and $21.4 billion in 2008.
As far as movies are concerned, there are only seven films to ever make more than $1 billion worldwide (check out boxofficemojo.com for stats).
It’s really hard to do a legitimate side-by-side comparison of film and video game sales. Box Office Mojo makes it super easy to get all the sales stats of any movie you need to know about, but there’s now equivalent for video game information. Despite scouring the internet, I couldn’t find a single comprehensive website where I could access sale records of various games. I had to piece together information from a number of different websites and articles just to include the few numbers I used in this post. We gaming geeks all know that the Call of Duty and Halo franchises make serious dough, but that’s all we know – an exact number is a mystery. Could somebody please just make a damn site like Box Office Mojo for video games?
Anyways, hopefully I’ve made my point. For now, movies may still be bigger than video games, but it’s clear that the scales are starting to tip closer to even.
