GTA V tops our all-time Excitement Buzz list for video games

Rockstar's mega-selling GTA V tops our all-time excitement list from the last 33 monthly Harris Buzz reports.

We regularly include the latest video games in our series of Harris Buzz reports - it's never an exhaustive measure of what's been released but we do our best to include the latest and greatest. And all the games are measured as close to the release date as possible.

The table below shows all the games (and gaming news) we've included over the last 3 years.

Due for release later this month, the next issue of Buzz includes Call of Duty: Ghosts and Battlefield 4. Will these topple GTA V from the top of the list?

Harris Buzz Excitement	% of GB public aged 16-64 excited about this
Grand Theft Auto V	22%	Rockstar
Sony PS4 announced	22%	Sony
Nintendo 3DS	22%	Nintendo
Xbox Kinect	22%	Xbox
Xbox One announced	21%	Xbox
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3	21%	Activision
Call of Duty: Black Ops	20%	Activision
PlayStation Vita released	19%	Sony
PlayStation 4 price £349	18%	Sony
Call of Duty: Black Ops 2	18%	Activision
FIFA 14	16%	EA
FIFA 13	16%	EA
Nintendo unveil ‘Wii U’	16%	Nintendo
LA Noire	16%	Rockstar
Portal 2	16%	Valve
Nintendo Wii U launch	15%	Nintendo
Assassin’s Creed III	15%	Ubisoft
Resident Evil: Retribution	15%	Capcom
Wii U console revealed	15%	Nintendo
Battlefield 3	15%	EA
Nintendo  ‘3DS XL’ released	14%	Nintendo
Kinect: Star Wars	14%	Xbox
Resident Evil 6 trailer	14%	Capcom
Kinect for PCs launch	14%	Xbox
Fable III	14%	Lionhead
PlayStation Vita unveiled	14%	Sony
Tomb Raider	13%	Square Enix
Need for Speed	13%	EA
Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games	13%	SEGA
Game chain bust	13%	Game
Batman: Arkham City	13%	Warner Bros Interactive
Crysis 2	13%	EA
Halo: Reach	13%	Bungie/Microsoft
Xbox One price £429	12%	Xbox
Halo 4	12%	Microsoft
Hitman: Absolution	12%	Square Enix
Resident Evil 6	12%	Capcom
Microsoft SmartGlass revealed	12%	Xbox
Mass Effect 3	12%	EA
FIFA 12	12%	EA
Homefront	12%	THQ
Microsoft Xbox digital DRM U-turn	11%	Xbox
BioShock Infinite	11%	2K
SimCity	11%	EA
Far Cry 3	11%	Ubisoft
Sleeping Dogs	11%	Square Enix
Max Payne 3	11%	Rockstar
Fallout: New Vegas	11%	Bethesda
Star Trek	10%	Namco Bandai
New Super Mario game	10%	Nintendo
PlayStation 3 slimmed	10%	Sony
Darksiders ll	10%	THQ
Guild Wars 2	10%	NCSoft
Microsoft Xbox Music launched	10%	Xbox
Gears of War 3	10%	Microsoft
Sony Move launched	10%	Sony
Nintendo 2DS launched	9%	Nintendo
The Last of Us	9%	Naughty Dog
Defiance series/game	9%	Trion
Gears of War: Judgement	9%	Microsoft
Crysis 3	9%	EA
Football Manager ‘13	9%	SEGA
Madden NFL 13	9%	EA
Diablo 3	9%	Blizzard
Rage	9%	Bethesda
Sonic the Hedgehog 20 years anniversary	9%	SEGA
Steam (gaming service)	9%	Valve
Saints Row IV	8%	Deep Silver
Rayman Legends	8%	Ubisoft
Ouya console unveiled	8%	Ouya
NBA 2K14	7%	2K
Total War: Rome II	7%	SEGA
Marvel Heroes	7%	Secret Identity
Devil May Care	7%	Capcom
Nintendo Land	7%	Nintendo
PS All-Star Battle Royale	7%	Sony
Dishonored	7%	Bethesda
Deus Ex: Human Revolution	7%	Square Enix
Grid 2	6%	Codemasters
nVidia game device unveiled	6%	nVidia
Disney Infinity	5%	Disney
Remember Me	5%	Capcom
NBA 2K13	5%	2K
Company of Heroes 2	4%	SEGA
World of Warcraft free	4%	Blizzard
Painkiller: Hell & Damnation	4%	Nordic

FIFA 14, Gravity and Hudl in latest Harris Buzz research

The October edition of Harris Buzz is out, our monthly look at what's hot in entertainment and technology polling a national representative Harris Poll sample.

The full report is available for free - click here.

This is what we measured this month:

• BBC to launch BBC One +1 channel
• BBC unveil the next-generation iPlayer
• FIFA 14 video game
• Gravity movie
• Homeland Series 3 begins on Channel 4
• LOVEFiLM makes available exclusive drama series, Copper
• NBA 2K14 video game
• Runner Runner movie
• Samsung launches smartphone with curved screen
• Sony Xperia Z1 goes on sale
• Tesco launches Hudl tablet
• Wuaki.tv launches in the UK
• YouTube launches its first Music Awards

Xbox One vs. PlayStation 4 research - the battle commences!

The June edition of Harris Buzz is now available - you can download the full free report here.

This latest edition allows us to compare the buzz for the Xbox One announcement/reveal with that measured for the PlayStation 4 event earlier in February.

As ever, our Harris Buzz reports look at the awareness, discussion level and excitement buzz for the latest news and releases in entertainment and technology.

As such it gives us the earliest preview of which of the two titans are most likely to succeed in the battle for the next generation. I'll leave Wii U aside as my earlier post suggests it is rather unlikely to be a contender.

So what's the story? How do Xbox One and PlayStation 4 compare for buzz?

Things couldn't be closer. Well they could, but statistically speaking a difference of 1% here or there is completely insignificant.

The two announcements are, in other words, completely tied for the level of Buzz created.

Now bear in mind this research was conducted directly after each console's announcement. So the data for PlayStation 4 comes from our February/March edition of Buzz. But this is the fairest comparison as we're looking here at the Buzz created directly after announcement.

Another thing to bear in mind is this fieldwork was conducted prior to E3, where even more details of the games were revealed (and we actually saw the PS4 console for the first time). We'll be measuring the E3 news in our next edition of Buzz, which will be available in July.

We'll continue to monitor the next gen battle. Will the PS4's lower price be a determining factor in which will be crowned king of the next gen? What about the "always on" connection for Xbox One and the restrictions for used games. What about using a Kinect to control a home media centre? Questions, questions.

As things stand, as far as the public is concerned, the battle is too close to call.

PlayStation 4 announcement - measuring the Buzz

Harris' latest Buzz report is out.

It includes the Buzz for Sony's announcement in late February of PlayStation 4.

The full report is free and you can see it here.

The results are more than decent, but not spectacular.

But Sony's announcement does easily beat the ratings achieved by the Wii U launch, and bear in mind we're comparing an announcement for a launch with an actual launch.

As always, released monthly, Harris Buzz measures, awareness and levels of discussion and excitement of the latest releases in news in entertainment and technology using a nationally representative Harris Poll of GB aged 16-64.

Sony's announcement was late February and the fieldwork for this edition of Buzz was early March, so just about perfect timing to appreciate the Buzz for it.

Let's take a look at the Buzz for "Sony announce PlayStation 4 games console"...

Things look a little better when we cut these Buzz ratings by age. Among 16-24s the levels of awareness, discussion and excitement are 67%, 50% and 42% respectively.

To put the results into context we can compare to our all-time list. We've been measuring news and product releases for over 2 years now, so we have lots of things to compare with.

Focusing on Excitement Buzz, here's a selection of benchmarks (you can see everything in the full report):

Bear in mind I am only showing a selection of the 200+ items we've looked at in our series of Buzz reports over the last couple of years. 

The PS4 launch ranks in the top quartile of everything we've tested for excitement when we compare it to everything we've tested to date. In the selected list above you can see it doesn't get close to our top-ranked event (London 2012 opening), but it'll take something exceptional to beat that benchmark. 

It's fairer to compare it to other high profile events - and you can see it's on a par with some Apple launches. The most interesting benchmarks are with Kinect, Vita and Wii U. Bear in mind though we are comparing an announcement of a launch to actual launches. 

It must be pleasing for Sony to see their announcement well ahead of the Wii U launch for excitement. And I've blogged before about how disappointing the Wii U launch has gone.

So, good solid results for PlayStation 4. Not spectacular results but a good foundation from which to build up to its launch later this year.

We'll be measuring PlayStation 4 again as more significant news comes out. And of course we will be measuring the Xbox announcement in May.

All of the news stories we tested in the latest edition of Buzz are listed below (and you can click here to get the full report).

2013 Brits music awards

2013 Oscars awards

BT agrees to buy ESPN’s UK TV channels to broaden its sports coverage

Cloud Atlas movie

Crysis 3 video game

Google unveil a touchscreen “Chromebook Pixel” premium laptop

HTC unveil HTC One flagship smartphone

One Direction hit number 1 with Comic Relief single “One Way or Another”

Samsung unveil new Galaxy Note 8.0 tablet

Sky buys O2’s broadband/fixed line business

Sony announce PlayStation 4 games console

The new Tomb Raider video game

Wreck-It Ralph movie

HMV closures gets the public talking in latest Buzz survey

Our latest Harris Buzz report is out, the 25th edition. Click here to get your free copy of the full report.

Among all the things we tested, the thing that has got most people talking is the news that HMV stores are going into administration.

Nearly 9 in 10 of the GB general public told us they were aware of the news and nearly 3 in 5 people said they have discussed it with their friends or family.

This makes it one of the most buzziest things for discussion we've ever covered in our 25 series of Buzz reports stretching back to 2010.

Take a look at the all-time Discussion Buzz list (top 25):

Top 25 Discussion Buzz % of GB public who have discussed...
London 2012 Olympics opening ceremony	75%
Jimmy Savile scandal	72%
Phone hacking scandal	66%
EURO 2012 final	61%
Skyfall movie	60%
HMV stores go into administration	58%
Andy Murray loses Wimbledon final	57%
Final Harry Potter film	55%
Stars at Jubilee concert	54%
2012 Olympic torch relay	54%
Steve Jobs dies	52%
The Voice new series	51%
Britain’s Got Talent new series	50%
Michael Jackson’s doctor guilty	48%
London 2012 tickets on sale	47%
Blockbuster administration	47%
BlackBerry outage	46%
The Hobbit movie	46%
Felix Baumgartner skydive	45%
Brits 2012	44%
Jimmy Carr tax story	43%
PS3 accounts hacked	43%
3D TV sets	42%
Fifty Shades of Grey	41%
Government email spying	41%

You'll also see that Blockbuster facing the same fate also gets into our Top 25 all-time list.

It's not surprising to see HMV get so high in our list. While so many of us have stopped using the High Street for our music, games and videos (the reason for its demise), it was really important for many of us a while back, before we migrated.

And there is a significant proportion of the population who haven't yet migrated to Amazon, Apple, Spotify et al who now have very few choices left in High Street to get their physical entertainment.

Yes, there are plenty of ways of getting entertainment, more than ever before, but if you're someone who isn't happy with shopping online and/or using digital services, then it's a sad day indeed to see such an important chain go under.

The whole list of things we covered in Buzz#25 is listed below. Click here to get the full, free report.

BlackBerry 10 smartphone revealed

Blockbuster stores go into administration

DMC: Devil May Cry video game

Facebook announce ‘Graph search’

HMV stores go into administration

JJ Abrams announced as Director of new Star Wars film

Lincoln movie

News International wins rights to show Premier League highlights on internet and mobile devices

Nokia targets Spotify with launch of premium Nokia Music+ service

Rapid rise of ‘Snapchat’ mobile app for sharing images or videos that disappear after a few seconds

Sony unveils Xperia Z, ‘thinnest’ tablet

Twitter launches ‘Vine’ micro-video sharing service

Zero Dark Thirty movie