We'll have a better idea of how Guitar Hero 5 and The Beatles: Rock Band stacked up against one another in September when we get the NPD data later this week, but as it stands now Activision is thumping its chest over the sales performance for Guitar Hero 5. Speaking to GI.biz, Dan Rosensweig, CEO of the Guitar Hero division, commented that Activision is "really pleased" and "we've probably sold more copies of Guitar Hero 5 than any other Guitar Hero game at launch."
He noted that the music category's been up 25% (although it's still down for the full year) and "we've been up over 50% - we feel really bullish about it." In Europe, Rosensweig suggested that Guitar Hero is outselling Rock Band as much as 3-to-1, and in the U.S. Activision's gotten some interesting data from retail.
"In the U.S. what we've seen is fascinating - we saw a very big launch and very big PR from our competitor, and we did incredibly well at the start. Our second and third week sales weren't really affected when they came out - but I went last night to the home pages of the big retailers, including GameStop, and we're a top-five selling game at GameStop right now. The other guys are nowhere to be found," he boasted.
Although Harmonix and MTV Games have put an emphasis on regular DLC, Activision has of course put its focus on producing more SKUs for retail. That said, it seems to be turning its attention to more downloadable songs for Guitar Hero now. "I'll tell you that each month is a record versus the previous month, and it's getting to the point of being interesting," Rosensweig said, referring to the increasing revenues from Guitar Hero DLC.
