Activision: Guitar Hero III is first title to generate sales of $1 billion

by Alexander Sliwinski on Jan 12th 2009 12:40PM

Activision recently announced that Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock has become the first game ever to reach $1 billion in sales. This comes a little under a year from when the publisher announced that the Guitar Hero franchise had surpassed the billion dollar mark. Not bad for a series the company picked up for a pittance at $100 million in 2006.

The success of the franchise isn't just good news for the game industry, as Activision Publishing CEO Mike Griffith has cited Nielson SoundScan data, which claims that artists featured in the Guitar Hero series have seen download sales increase between 15-843%. As for the publisher's financial standing, if GameStop's top selling holiday titles are any indication, Activision should enjoy a lucrative quarter headlined by Guitar Hero World Tour, Call of Duty: World at War and that Lich King guy from the World of Warcraft.

Source

Tags: activision, activision-blizzard, guitar-hero, guitar-hero-3, guitar-hero-iii, guitar-hero-world-tour, PS2, PS3, Wii, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (63)

So sad that it wasn't even a good game.

Yeah, I hate it when bad games keep selling and selling and selling and selling...

Why not? It has great songs. Is it because its not made by Harmonix?

@Fenix

Ding Ding Ding!!! WE HAVE A WINNER!!!

Seriously, GHIII isn't bad at all. In fact I kind of enjoyed it a bit more than I did Rockband. Whether or not one is better than the other is completely up for debate, however that doesn't change the fact that both games are fun to bring at parties. I just don't get the argument that BECAUSE YOU LIKE ROCKBAND/GUITAR HERO YOU HAVE TO HATE THE COMPETING PRODUCT AND ANY PERSON WHO LIKES SAID PRODUCT ARE JUST SHEEP AND STUPID MAN!!!

I'm with Fenix and Vegeta on this one...I own GHII, GHIII, GHWT, RB and RB2, and the only one I haven't enjoyed all that much was the first RB because to me the song selection kinda blew. I LOVE me some RB2 and GHWT, because now my friends and I can get hammered and have a full band comprised of stoopid. There's no point in hating on one brand or the other just because one is your favorite...it's okay to love both at once! Just remember that applying this doesn't work as well in other areas, like marriage.

I have actually never played either Rock Bands. I did like the first two GH games but there was something about GHIII that I did not like. Maybe it was those battle mode things that upset me and how stupid they felt.

At the risk of sounding repetitive:

1) Horrid character redesigns.
2) Terrible "Boss Battle" concept.
3) "Legends of Rock" despite only having Slash as an actual legend.
4) Artificially pumped up difficulty level.
5) Mediocre DLC support.

GHII is the best GH title to date. If you were to take GHII and remake it as a full band game...it'd probably be the best music game to date period.

I have GHIII on PS3, GHWT and RB2 on 360. I like all 3 games BUT, I'm a n00b and can only play on medium. RB2 on medium is too easy and slooooooowwwwww unlike GH3/WT. I have to put Breakneck Speed on RB2 so it can be fun. I'm getting the hang of it on Hard but I just dont put enough time or care that much to be that good to put the time in. In summary I like all of them but GH3/WT is a slightly more fun to me. Note layouts are just a little more fun to play. I like RB2's graphics and presentation over GH though.

Sidenote, I suck on drums and never play them. That might be another argument as to which is better in said games.

GH3 wasn't a bad game, it just wasn't as good as GH2.

With that said, GHWT is a subpar game compared to RB/RB2 on the same level that GH3 was not as good as GH2. That's not to say it's a horrible game, it's just not as good as RB. The core of actually playing the songs is so similar between the two that it's impossible to honestly love one and hate the other.

T

That reminds me, I can find GHII on the cheap. Only thing I hear is that there are a lot of bad covers in it.

1) "Horrid character redesigns." Completely disagree. I found the cartoony look of the avatars in GHIII much more appealing than the generic "Realistic" avatars RB had.
2) "Terrible "Boss Battle" concept." I had absolutely no problem with the boss battles.
3) "Legends of Rock" despite only having Slash as an actual legend. Oh come on, who gives a shit? It's just a name.
4) "Artificially pumped up difficulty level." If that's one of the reasons why you don't like the game, then I'm afraid I'd have to call you a pussy. Seriously this reason is the main reason why I enjoyed GHIII more than I did RB(I have no idea if this was fixed for RB2). In GHIII when you moved up to the next difficulty level, it felt like you were actually getting better at the game and that you were accomplishing something. The problem with RB is that many of the songs are just too damn easy to play. And while that doesn't mean the songs aren't fun to play, I'm just saying I had alot more fun with GHIII because of the challenge.
5) "Mediocre DLC support." This is the only one I'll give you since yeah it's disappointing that there wasn't alot of DLC for this game.

When getting together with friends, Rock Band / Guitar Hero WT are usually the activity we keep coming back to when we can think of nothing else to do. I enjoy both games a lot, but I have to say that Rock Band is easier to 'get into'. The immersion factor is the only reason I'd say that it was the better game.

1) "Horrid character redesigns."

- Agree 100%, the new GH still has the freaky cliche robot people. Even the new metallica looks like it will have the same problem [from the trailer.]

2) "Terrible "Boss Battle" concept."

- I admit this was the only reason I came back to GHIII, when I found out they pretty much took em out of GH:WT i had no reason to really buy it/play it.

3) "Legends of Rock" despite only having Slash as an actual legend.

- If you have a theme, you better go with it. I especially hated how they had only one legend per instrument in GH:WT, I'd say a minimum of 3 and that's pushing it.

4) "Artificially pumped up difficulty level."

- I agree again. I'm able to beat all the songs on GH3 with few exceptions. Like through the fire and flames, but that doesn't really count since that's so overcharted it's just a joke.

5) "Mediocre DLC support."

- I hadn't payed for a single song on GH3, I now have over 350 songs on RB2.

"If that's one of the reasons why you don't like the game, then I'm afraid I'd have to call you a pussy."

I'm going to have to call you out as GH fanboy then (or at least as the ever annoying "Scorehero Type"). Because (as is typical of their type), you automatically assume the person sucks if they say that GHIII was artifically difficult.

The charting in GHIII sucks. There are ways to make a game challenging without having to resort to making everything a triple chord. Look at GHII, which had an amazing song list and still managed to provide a challenge.

Those who typically argue that RB is "boring" are the same ones who typically don't care what song they're playing, as they're too busy charting overdrive/star power paths and finding optimum chances to squeeze points (or whatever the heck it is).

Nobody's saying "challenges suck", they're saying "artificial challenges suck". I liken it to a fighting game where the only thing that changes as the difficulty goes up is how much the AI blocks.

That's funny xGENAERAL DEATHx. I find RB1 to have the best on-disc songs. RB2 has too much filler in the Alt/Punk genres although the Prog selection is much better.

@ T I use Scorehero and I don't give shit about pathing. I use paths but don't plan them out.

@ Vegeta Really you like the Robo drummer? He looks like he was animated on flash by a twelve year old. Also its a good thing that Thrasher, Afterlife, Constant Motion and the Malmsteem pack are so easy.

Guitar Hero III didn't have an artificially inflated difficulty. It had an unbalanced learning curve (tiers 1-6 not that bad, tiers 7 and 8 impossible), but there wasn't anything inflated about it.

@rcf

Are you smoking something??

GH3 wasn't that bad of a game sure it did have its issues but all and all it did make me a lot better at rhythm. Also back to what you guys are saying first I had no problems with the boss battles I beat the first two on expert first try lou's battle took a 30 minutes not much longer than that.
Second the "legends of rock" theme, did their were actually a few that were featured in the videos and I think we are all forgetting about Tom Morello.
Third artificially pumped up levels
Well this one my opinion is kinda useless because i 5 starred every single song in the game (including dlc)
I got a lot more enjoyment out of playing that game than rb1 so I have no problem with it.

Well, I love GHII. Love it.

Incredibly misleading. They're talking about revenue.

Comparing revenue of a software-only product like a game to a game that derives most of its value from the plastic guitars that comes with it is not really a useful comparison.

Software has a near 100% gross profit margin, but not so when you have to start making plastic accessories. Not to mention your shipping and support (replacement) costs go through the roof.

I tell you what, if I can count hardware bundles that contain a game as games for purposes of revenue, then the Wii (which is merely Wii Sports with the hardware necessary to play it) made a lot more than $1B, and it got there a before GH3 did.

Yeah, I was about to post "I'm pretty sure Wii Sports was the first title generate $1B"...

but i think the article is saying that its the first game to have consumers spend A LOT of MONEY, not A LOT of CONSUMERS spend money. although i thought that too when i read the article, its still a peice of news to share. the wii sports argument actually un-credited your comment for me as the hardware bundeled with it is the actual console, and not a game-spesific device.

Is that from Wicked?

Correct.

You're also correct if you assume that I'm a theatre geek.

Nada Surf would have been a better pick. Or maybe I'm just very, very old.

Yeah it's nada surf.

@vegeta, no, it's "Popular" from Wicked - saw it this weekend (though the Nada Surf song was cool too).

-p-

I thought it was Nada Surf at first too. Nice to know I'm not the only person who's heard of them.

You're so novel!!

I don't think Guitar Hero (or Rock Band for that matter) is all that great.

There. I said it.

BLASPHEMER! Get him!!!

Nah, I get your point. I hated GHII when I first played it (mostly cos it was the first guitar game I played and didn't get it) but eventually I got all over it and then GHIII which had some good songs, but I didn't like as much and now I love RockBand.

I think it's part of the casual gaming thing, you don't have to be good at games and play regularly to step up to the easy plate. 2 or 3 songs and you should be able to get to the end of easy with the band, then you get the khakis, then you get the girls.

There's always the stupid difficult expert level for the hardcore fans too, so it bridges the gap and there-in lies the appeal.

I remember when I bought GH2 for the PS2, the game was alright and it was pretty cool at first but I realized that the fun stopped after completing Medium with 5 stars. Hard was just about as fun as watching a Peanuts rerun for the 5th time.

I enjoyed the music but that is half a lie because there only were like 6 songs I wanted to play which were disperse through the whole game. I had to complete 4 songs I didn’t liked to reach the one I actually wanted to play to the point I didn’t give a crap about hard mode.

ah but will it blend?

probably

yeah, that's from wicked. I'm surprised that they would use something like that...

World of Warcraft says "Hi".

Product sales, not subscription sales.

Eh, it's just technicality bullshit.

They say Guitar Hero III is the first to generate retail sales of $1 billion, which I believe has a lot to do with the bundles costing around $90 at launch. They probably don't even consider for a second WoW subscriptions, which have made WELL over a billion in revenue, but not retail sales.

Tricky tricky.

I am impressed with the 'Wicked' reference, though now I have the song stuck in my head. Thanks Joystiq!!

As for the press release, I think he might be using some "fuzzy" math there. I wish I could make statistics say I earned a billion dollars.

Just change "billion" to "bajillion" and you'll be fine.

One....BIIIILLION dollars!

Some has sold their soul to Satan for this.

Between this and World of Warcraft, Bobby Kotick is really going to buttsore in the afterlife..

Yup RB/GH officially the new gen Karaoke.

"...have seen download sales increase between 15-843%. "

Well that's a useful metric.

Well, it precludes download sales being up 850%.

Too bad it was also the first Guitar Hero to suck...

Somehow, the thought of Judy Nails singing Popular is both terrifying and intriguing to me, lol.

i demand Wicked DLC for world tour or rock band 2!!!

Why is this feat considered good news for the VG industry? It sounds like it's just good news for Activision. Did I miss the announcement where Activision stated that they are going to share their profits with all of the other VG companies?

ME GRIMLOCK HATE POPULAR THING! SMASH POPULAR THING!!!!

I contributed to this statistic, as well as bolstering Gamestop's revenue by trading it in a week later.

Needless to say, I'm not proud of myself.

| 1 | 2 | Most Recent | Next 50 Comments

Sorry, you must be logged in to leave a comment.

Breaking News

The most popular posts
in the last 7 days

Vita 'UMD Passport' won't be offered in US 217 comments
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning review: A tempting fate 150 comments
David Jaffe leaves Eat Sleep Play, layoffs hit developer [Update] 107 comments
Don't call it a remake: Final Fantasy X is a 'remaster,' to be clear 94 comments
Battleship movie adapted into FPS by Double Helix 90 comments

Activision: Guitar Hero III is first title to generate sales of $1 billion

Reader Comments (63)

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:44PM Lordchimp said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:00PM xFenixKnightx said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:07PM Vegeta has a ps3 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:10PM xGeneral DEATHxDEETH82 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:19PM Lordchimp said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:34PM TRTX said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:35PM xFenixKnightx said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:36PM oolz said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:39PM xFenixKnightx said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:50PM Vegeta has a ps3 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:04PM nandokun said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:07PM Tiptup300 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:20PM TRTX said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:27PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:40PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 3:19PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 6:58PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 7:25PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 14th 2009 5:04PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:48PM spin cycle said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:07PM thesimplicity said

Posted: Jan 17th 2009 7:28PM mynk said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:48PM McWeen said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:53PM ArtificeDrake formerly known as said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:00PM John Z said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:09PM Vegeta has a ps3 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 3:36PM pdiddy said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 7:15PM ArtificeDrake formerly known as said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:49PM ArtificeDrake formerly known as said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:53PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:32PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:52PM Shmil said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:57PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 10:06PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 12:57PM copa said

Posted: Jan 13th 2009 3:14PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:37PM darkinchworm said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:16PM tiny415 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:14PM baby sea tuna said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:14PM R0ck said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:23PM Rask said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:28PM Ryudo said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:31PM Shagittarius said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:00PM spin cycle said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:32PM bmill3 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:34PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:37PM blehh said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 1:49PM Levi Partridge said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:10PM xGeneral DEATHxDEETH82 said

Posted: Jan 12th 2009 2:14PM baby sea tuna said

Info

Description

MSRP

Release Date

Genre

Developer

Publisher

Rating

Breaking News

Double Fine returning to its adventure game roots with Kickstarter project [update: 315K down!]

Featured Stories

Portabliss: Time Ducks (iOS)

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning review: A tempting fate

Portabliss: Sticky Bees (iOS)

The most popular postsin the last 7 days

Engadget

TUAW

Massively

WoW

The most popular posts
in the last 7 days