Grand Theft Auto IV's First Week Sales: $500mm and 6mm Units

GTA IV somehow proved to be even bigger than the expectations. Tomorrow morning, Take Two Interactive will report that Grand Theft Auto IV:

- Sold 3.6 million units in the first day - Sold 6 million units in the first week - Hit $500 million in sales in the first week

The New York Times notes that these results beat analyst expectations by 20%.

To put this in perspective, last weekend's opening of Iron Man brought in a record-breaking $201mm globally... GTA IV did 2.5x that. Of course unit prices are drastically different - but these are massive numbers.

Iron Man's Opening Weekend Box Office? $201mm Worldwide

Much of the talk over the weekend was about how Yahoo's stock would react now that Microsoft's offer was retracted (down 15% and ~$24)... but it was a magnificent weekend on a different front: Marvel jumped nearly 10% as Iron Man, the first release by Marvel Studios, earned $201 million in worldwide box office sales and $104 million in the US. Marvel raised its outlook for the year and promised to release Iron Man 2 in 2010.

I am eager to see the first reported numbers for Grand Theft Auto IV and, once they are released, how that will impact Take Two Interactive and Sony.