MTV Games' The Beatles Rock Band (which Electronic Arts distributes as part of its EA Partners program) already outsold Guitar Hero 5 in the U.S. during September, with nearly 600,000 units sold. EA CEO John Riccitiello is hoping that sales continue to pick up for the game, particularly as consumers become more active at retail for the holiday season.
Speaking to Fox Business, he commented, "Games like The Beatles Rock Band are going to pick up in a big way right before the Thanksgiving holiday; that's really when the consumers and the moms buy things to put under the tree. ... We've seen strong sales on Beatles Rock Band so far, but what we don't see yet is the holiday traffic, and we never do until the middle of November."
He added, "I do want to point out that the number one grossing application on iPhone right now is Beatles Rock Band." We're going to assume he just meant Rock Band, since Beatles Rock Band doesn't even exist on iPhone.
Riccitiello also says something ludicrous earlier on about how most people get 50-60 hours out of games, and even up to 100 hours sometimes. Fox doesn't even bat an eye at this. As we know, most games are somewhere in the range of 10-20 hours, with the exception of long RPGs, MMOs or games that have lasting year-round appeal like Rock Band or Guitar Hero. We do applaud Riccitiello, however, for educating Fox on Tim Schafer when asked about Brutal Legend, and giving the veteran developer his due. Check out the full interview below. [Note: it seems to have some trouble playing in the Safari browser, but Firefox works fine.]
