GTA IV Hits Guinness World Records

Grand Theft Auto IV has already qualified for Guinness World Records as Highest Grossing Video Game in 24 Hours and Highest Revenue Generated by an Entertainment Product in 24 Hours.

Grand Theft Auto IV racked up the units and bucks as soon as it went on sale on April 29th, but it made its creators very happy when it was announced yesterday that the video game, that’s barely in the stores, had broken two world records.

Guinness World Records announced that the game had qualified for records as Highest Grossing Video Game in 24 Hours and Highest Revenue Generated by an Entertainment Product in 24 Hours. On its first day of release GTA IV sold a staggering 3.6 million copies, which brought in a total of $310 million.

By the end of its first week, that figure had shot up to more than $500 million. But it’s a sign of the game’s popularity – and the sold-out signs in many stores – that spammers had been using it as a tool to make people open spam e-mails containing malware.

The previous video game record holder was Halo 3, which took in $170 million in 24 hours. The Entertainment Products records were held by Spiderman 3, which took in $60 million and the book Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, whose first-day earning were $220 million.