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We met up with Michael Pachter at GDC yesterday. In return for us showing him where to pick up his badge and sneaking him into the Luminaries Lunch, he told us why he thought Rockstar and Microsoft have yet to release any concrete download numbers for GTA IV DLC, The Lost and Damned.
The Wedbush Morgan analyst reckoned the content has so far failed to meet expectations for either company.
“It’s not like The Lost and Damned sucked, because it didn’t, and it’s not because [they] did not market it well,” he said.
“I just don’t think it has met their expectations, and it would have been better if they had set their expectations realistically.”
Pachter opined that the Live attach rate is one of the reasons The Lost and Damned hadn’t hit the intended mark.
“The main reason is because not too many Xbox 360 owners are hooked up to Xbox Live,” he said.
“100 percent of GTA IV owners are not hooked up to XBL. Therefore by definition, not every single person who owns GTA IV has Xbox Live. Because of this, I don’t think the numbers were as high as they had hoped for.
“When I personally look at DLC, I wait until the second one is released, that way I have over 40 hours of extra content instead of 20. It’s like playing a whole other game,” he added. “And I think a lot of people feel the same way.
He also added that he expects Rockstar to eventually offer a special edition of GTA IV to include both The Lost and Damned and the second, in-the-works piece of DLC.
Viewing 27 responses
G1GAHURTZ said:
“Pachter opined that the Live attach rates is one of the reasons The Lost and Damned hadn’t hit the intended mark.
“The main reason is because not too many Xbox 360 owners are hooked up to Xbox Live,” he said.”
Strange comment, considering his apparent belief that consoles are going to become obsolete largely due to an online only gaming service.
ShakaCarnage said:
17m concurrent users of Xbox Live. I’d say around 20% of those would have GTA IV.
If only I could get paid to guess shit all the time like he does.
Blerk said:
And didn’t we determine the other week that over half of the 360 user base were hooked up? Which would still equate to many millions of sales if everybody who bought a 360 copy of GTA IV also bought the DLC.
It is odd that they haven’t released the figures, though. I presumed they were waiting to hit a particular target, but that seems less likely the more time passes.
G1GAHURTZ said:
I thought that MS had a policy of never releasing figures for sales on Live??
They certainly don’t for Major Nelson’s ‘Most played game’ thingy…
Am I wrong?
SERAPHEMZ said:
If it were good news, knowing Microsoft and Greenturd, they would have rubbed it in everyones noses. But as it stands, they just say that its the best selling XBL game, and would beat a regular games sales but decide to hold back on the numbers.
Doesnt make sense to me.
Psychotext said:
Wait… wasn’t he the one just recently that said it’s sold a load and will go on to sell a load more?
Edit – Yeah:
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3173150
He says 1m sold and 2m by October… sounds to me like he was the one with unrealistic expectations.
theevilaires said:
just be patient and we’ll see how things unfold at E3. I have a feeling Sony will strike hard after what happened last year. I wonder what kind of bonuses Rockstar got last year…
Shatner said:
You’re all missing the obvious source of the disparity in statements:
Pachter has an evil twin called Patcher.
Psychotext said:
Damn… we’ve been had!
Madgame said:
Just a guess but I’d imagine the $20 price tag didn’t go over too well with alot of gamers either.
theevilaires said:
lol be nice shatner people make mistakes
epic_wanderer said:
I can’t understand people bitching about the price tag when compared against the full game, the other content on live and the DLC itself.
Patrick Garratt said:
God. I’ve changed it.
Shatner said:
Pat, add it to your spell-check dictionary because I’ve spotted it dozens and dozens of times.
SERAPHEMZ said:
I didnt even notice that it was shatner….
whathappenedtotheoldshatnerlol ????
Audio Radar said:
But which is the real one? And which is his Tyler Durden?
Patrick Garratt said:
*scours*
Shatner said:
SERAPHEMZ, give me £50 and I’ll tell you.
Pat, it’s clean on this page but it’s all over the place in other articles where he or his evil twin are mentioned. Easy mistake to make, but a mistake nonetheless. Journalists mis-spelling the name of their subjects never looks good.
SERAPHEMZ said:
Shatner – how much is that in dollars?
wz said:
Dollarlol! All your bailout money won’t buy you a sixpack of beer here in Europe.
deftangel said:
In the early days of the 360 Microsoft were quoting figures of approximately 60% of 360 owners were signed into Live and 80% of them had downloaded something. This held up for the first couple of years, longer than most thought it would.
These days, on one hand you’ve got increasing sales of the Arcade model to more casual consumers, who might be less likely to go online with their consoles. On the other hand, broadband is becoming more and more ubiquitous. Not having built in wireless can’t help mind.
I’d say Pachter’s original conjecture of 1m – 2m from an addressable market of about 3m wasn’t far off. What he might be forgetting is the long tail effect. It’s not about the day 1 numbers anymore. I will buy Lost & Damned but I haven’t yet. If Microsoft stick it in one of those weekly promotions it’ll shift a hell of a lot more.
SERAPHEMZ said:
Just like everything else now a days, its not really about the quality, its about the price.
Blerk said:
Wait, people bitched about the price of TLAD? Surely it’s one of the best-value chunks of DLC out there for what you get?
SERAPHEMZ said:
my comment was directed towards deftangel, who stated that in his opinion it would sell more it its was in a “weekly promotion”
SplatteredHouse said:
I think there being an article tag of “Patcher” remain great for epic lols! http://www.vg247.com/?s=Patcher
In fact, I originally thought you had all misspelled his name on purpose.
Whizzo said:
TLAD was almost too cheap, you get a lot for the cash and it’s worth every point.
ShakaCarnage said:
I might add at this point that since the launch of NXE, sell-through on DLC has risen by over 50%, due to increased presence and game-specific shop-front style placement.
GTA IV doesn’t have as much exposure now, but content is so much easier to find.
At my latest guesstimate, Xbox 360 has, or will very soon sell through 30m units worldwide, and MS will announce 20m concurrent Live subscribers at E3. . I could be wrong, but if I was a betting man….