Guitar Hero 3 Is The Highest Grossing Retail Game Ever, Claims Activision

January 12, 2009 1:35 PM

The 2007 release of Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock has proven to be the highest-grossing retail game ever, according to Activision Publishing CEO Mike Griffith.

Guitar Hero III crossed $1 billion in sales during the 2008 during the holiday season, Griffith revealed during an Activision CES presentation, as reported by Edge Online.

Griffith claimed that Guitar Hero III is the first single game to hit the $1 billion milestone at retail. It was released on PC, Xbox 360, PS2, PS3 and Wii, with Neversoft on the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions, Vicarious Visions on Wii, Budcat on PS2, and Aspyr on PC.

The success of the series has also lead to greater success for the bands it helps promote, with data-tracking firm Nielsen reporting that after a band appears in Guitar Hero, download sales of the band's songs jump between 15% and 843%.

Chris Faylor

Chris Faylor was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

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RikiTiki2

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January 12, 2009 1:40 PM

first, i wonder how much WoW has grossed altogether.
then i see the story pic and think boobies.

now i don't know what to think
- stelth
  
   reply
  January 12, 2009 2:25 PM
  
  Indeed. I'm sure World of Warcraft makes more than Guitar Hero III each MONTH.
  - Chris Faylor
    
     reply
    January 12, 2009 2:26 PM
    
    Yeah, but that's not retail sales, that's subscription revenue.
    - fffortune
      
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      January 12, 2009 8:37 PM
      
      WoW must've a massive amount of retail sales as well. Let's say that about 5 times as many as are currently playing bought the game, then that's about 60 million sales. Of course that's including Asia, and I don't know how their model works exactly, but I guess they have some sort of start-up cost for each account as well?
      
      Then again, the original WoW dropped a lot in price before it ever became as big as it is today, and didn't cost as much as this one does from the beginning either. It'd be interesting if Blizzard ever released numbers on this.