GTA V makes $800m in one day, guns down Call of Duty

Grand Theft Auto V has hijacked Call of Duty's record for the most money made by a video game in a single day. The latest instalment in Rockstar's controversial series made a staggering $800m (£495m) on launch day, its publisher Take-Two has announced.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, released in November last year, made a piffling $500m on its debut and was previously the so-called "biggest entertainment launch of all time".

By comparison, the biggest opening weekend ever for a movie was the finale of Harry Potter, which took $483m worldwide. That obviously represents more fans, as it's much cheaper to go to the pictures than buy a £40 game.

With an estimated development and marketing budget of £170m, the game has made a stonking great profit already. The game is yet to launch in Japan and Brazil, not insignificant markets for the crim-ulator, and is likely to sell millions more when it launches on PC, Xbox One and PS4, although those version are yet to be announced.

“All of us at Take-Two are thrilled with the initial response to Grand Theft Auto V," said a rather smug Take-Two boss Strauss Zelnick. "Once again, the team at Rockstar Games have outdone themselves, setting the entertainment industry's new standard for creativity, innovation and excellence."

The game also received rapturous reviews, with metascores of 98 per cent on Xbox and 97 on PS3. As always, it's sparked some controversy, from a tired retread of the simplistic 'do games make kids violent?' debate to a more mature discussion of its attitude to women.

Have you contributed to GTA's stonking success? What do you make of it so far? Is it everything you hoped for, or a bit of a let down? Give your verdict in the comments, or on our clean-as-a-whistle Facebook page.