Red Dead Redemption 2 Sales Slowing Down As Online Mode Leaving Beta Soon

Red Dead Redemption 2 is a huge hit, though sales appear to be slowing. Take-Two Interactive, which owns developer Rockstar Games, announced today that the open-world western has now shipped 24 million copies.

That's up from the 23 million figure that Take-Two announced in November. Growth for the title seems to be slowing. Red Dead Redemption 2 shipped 17 million copies right at launch, with a further six million coming by November. One million copies shipped since then is impressive but it's on a slower pace than before.

Red Dead Redemption 2 also makes money from Red Dead Online's microtransactions. Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick confirmed on an earnings call that Red Dead Online will exit beta during the current quarter, so it should happen soon. Red Dead Online launched in November as a beta, and it has remained in beta since then with Rockstar supporting it with new content regularly.

The signs are looking good for Red Dead Online to continue to be a huge success, as Zelnick said Red Dead Online is performing better than GTA Online over similar periods of time after release. "We have very high expectations for that title going forward," Zelnick said. This is specifically related to various engagement metrics that Zelnick did not expand on. He did add that Rockstar learned a lot from the release of GTA Online, lessons that were applied to RDR Online.

A PC edition of Red Dead Redemption 2 is rumored, but nothing is confirmed at this stage. Whatever the case, launching on PC would presumably help improve sales, which might be what Take-Two is looking for given sales of the game on PS4 and Xbox One are slowing.

Take-Two also announced in its earnings report today that Rockstar's previous game, Grand Theft Auto V, has now shipped an astonishing 110 million copies sold. It was also confirmed that NBA 2K19 has now shipped 9 million copies.