Saints Row Publisher THQ Not Concerned With GTA V Hype

When Take-Two formally unveiled Grand Theft Auto V with a trailer on Wednesday, some saw it as a strategic move against THQ, which owns the sandbox action genre this Holiday season with the upcoming Saints Row: The Third. THQ president Brian Farrell doesn't see it that way at all. "It's a very different game," he told investors in a Gamasutra-attended conference call. According to Farrell, today's trailer -- which launched alongside a new Saints Row trailer -- clearly showed the difference between the two franchises. Grand Theft Auto focuses on depth and realism, while Saints Row emphasizes "all the crazy stuff in the game." "It's a totally different positioning to the consumer," he explained, saying that many fans enjoy both franchises simultaneously, as Saints Row is "a very very different game that knows what it is." The company is relatively coy when it comes to sales projections, only saying that it plans to exceed the 3 million this fiscal year that Saints Row 2 sold in its debut. "We've been doing this a long time, we think we have a very solid plan around the title. And it's very difficult to answer the question: How high can it go?" Farrell said. Though numbers were not given, the company said that preorders for the game are up over the previous iteration, despite having one less SKU. "It appears that the rebrand is working," Farrell said.