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GameVision asked 6,728 gamers about Grand Theft Auto IV to tell us about their experiences of the GTA franchise in more detail.
Rockstar?Games and Take-Two recently announced that the Grand Theft Auto franchise has now shipped in total a staggering 114m units, with GTA IV alone shipping over 22m.
This week we’re going to look at the GTA brand using the GameVision Brand Map you can buy direct from the MCV Reports page.6,728 gamers were questioned about the game, of whom 1,716 had played it in the last six months. 528 of these told us more.
GTA is dominated by male gamers, with a 4:1 ratio of male to female players. And despite the GTA titles usually carrying 18+ ratings, 20 per cent of players are aged under 16.
It’s not just the latest title – GTA IV – that is being played; San Andreas (35 per cent) and Vice City (14 per cent) still remain popular years after their release.
GTA often attracts unwanted criticism for its levels of violence, but it’s this violence and combat that a lot of gamers enjoy (29 per cent and 22 per cent respectively). However, more gamers enjoy other features of the game, namely ‘doing things I cannot do in real life’ and ‘involvement in a story’ (37 per cent and 34 per cent respectively). GTA would not be the game it is if it wasn’t for the violence and escapism that exists in worlds like Liberty City.
So what’s next? In GTA IV we saw the introduction of online play and Rockstar showed how DLC can be made an essential (rather than simply a ‘nice-to-have’) addition to a gaming experience. User-generated content has the potential to be the next step forward to encompass a creative element to gameplay. Whatever Rockstar does next, there are certainly 22m individuals waiting for GTA V.
You can find this and other Brand Maps atwww.mcvuk.com/reports.
