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Posted by: Stephanie Carmichael

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The Grand Theft Auto open-world action series has shipped (not sold) 125 million copies to date.

Take-Two Interactive chief executive officer Strauss Zelnick announced the milestone at the at the Credit Suisse 2012 Technology Conference. It marks a difference of 11 million from last year's figure, 114 million, which Take-Two revealed in September 2011.

The distributor confirmed that Grand Theft Auto 4 shipped 25 million but did not attribute numbers to the other games. Zelnick likened the series' popularity to the James Bond films, saying that GTA's release schedule of a new game every two years helps make it "special." But what about once a year, like Activision's Call of Duty?

"Our view is it's hard to make permanent intellectual properties if you annualize it, with the exception of sports titles," he said. "So far, that's proven to be the case. IP that is annualized eventually seems to hit the wall, and we don't want our IP to hit the wall."

Grand Theft Auto 5 is due out in Q2 2013.

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[GameSpot]

Tags: Grand Theft Auto, Take-Two Interactive