'Call of Duty' game sells $310M in 24 hours

[The Straight Story]

'Call of Duty' game sells $310M in 24 hours

SANTA MONICA (AP) - First-day sales of Activision Blizzard Inc.'s "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" broke records, raking in an estimated $310 million in North America and the United Kingdom alone.

The video game went on sale all over the world on Tuesday, but Activision provided figures Thursday only for North America and Britain. The company estimates that it sold about 4.7 million copies of the game in the first 24 hours in those markets, making it the biggest-selling launch in the history of entertainment.

The latest installment in the "Call of Duty" action franchise was expected to at least match last year's "Grand Theft Auto IV," which was the most successful video game release in history and at the time may have been the top entertainment launch ever.

That game, from Take-Two Interactive Software Inc., had sold 3.6 million units on its opening day, worth $310 million worldwide. "Call of Duty" made that much in just North America and Britain.

The launch of "Call of Duty" also easily brought in more than last year's record $155 million opening weekend for the Batman movie "The Dark Knight."

http://www.thecalifornian.com/article/20091112/NEWS01/91112011/+Call+of+Duty++game+sells++310M+in+24+hours

Side note here, "The Dark Knight" might have had only $155 million for weekend, but was much cheaper to get a ticket (Around $45 for the game and say $10 for a movie ticket).

[tblue]

1. Boy, am I in the wrong business.

[freakydeeky]

52. i don't know about that...

game business is risky risky business. history of gaming is littered with dead companies. you can have a big hit, but you can also have a chain of failures which sap you quick. the new numbers for earnings are big, but the budgets have grown proportionally as well and so the risk is still there. its why sequels like with movie business are so popular. many highly rated games like psychonauts were financial failures as well, so quality doesn't garrantee success either.

[cbdo2007]

2. What recession?

[YOY]

3. 60 bucks a pop and winable within 15 hours.

We gamers are stupid mother fuckers and settle for one ultra sweet hyped moment of sweetness when we should all be holding out for a 90 hours standard.

Meh...I'll play it later. Dragon Age is the sweetness.

[dorkulon]

4. I had CoD 4 and it was fantastic, but over way too soon.

I'm not really into the multiplayer frag-fest, either. Great game though; I felt like I might get PTSD from it.

[Hippo_Tron]

6. The multiplayer value expands that time quite a bit

In fact I only buy multiplayer games these days. The one exception is Zelda, but they only make one of those every few years.

[YOY]

7. I'm kind of the opposite...I will play a few Multiplayer but I prefer to game solo.

It's fun with a fun crew. DUer Ignis and I have gamed together.

[TCJ70]

10. Dragon Age does have promise...

...lately I've been getting into the more open ended games (Oblivion/Fallout 3). Hopefully more games like this can come out. I want an epic adventure rather than a shiny object that is outshone in a few hours.

[YOY]

29. It's got more than promise.

It delivers. I'd prefer a few changes though...

[TCJ70]

30. As soon as I can justify spending the cash on it...

...I'll be picking it up for PS3.

[Romulox]

40. Cover doesn't work right in DA. Archers shoot me through walls. nt

[YOY]

42. Inventory system blows too...as does looting.

In Baldur's Gate...you kill a gobbo with leather armor and an axe usually the little flipper drops leather armor and an axe. In DA you get some random lootage.

And a diamond takes as much space in your back pack as a suit of Plate Mail armor.

I still want 6 people in my party too.

All things considered...still awesomeness.

[Romulox]

51. Nod. $7 for a short romp + a storage chest is a rip off too...

Still, I was hooked after the first boss fight. I'm in Denerim right now, and battles are consisting of what seems like 10-15 guys each time. Aoe time! Fucking awesome.

Er...

/geek

[TornadoTN]

39. Dragon Age is an amazing game - my favorite of the past few years

I loved Baldurs Gate 1 & 2, so maybe I'm biased. But the game is just engrossing - it really draws you in and the story is top notch.

[Romulox]

43. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that DA is the best game of its type, ever.

It's better than BG2 and Planescape: Torment, and I love those games! Damn hard too! :wow:

[Arkana]

13. I'm playing Dragon Age too!

Did you play the DLC?

[cbdo2007]

16. Makes me feel better about my Tiger Woods 2010 (wii) purchase. I've put LOTS of time

into it over the past 5 months and still enjoy it immensely. I know it's kind of a wussy game compared to COD but was def worth the $60/time ratio.

[Mike Daniels]

20. Dragon Age is a return to form for Bioware

Hell, coming across a conversational option that hints at the relationship between one of your party members and his guardian being "sordid" was almost worth the price of the game alone. As it is I'm 20 hours in and I've yet to complete even one of the central plotline quests.

I liked Mass Effect alright but the party mechanic in that game was lacking somewhat in that it eliminated almost all of the cross party banter that set off Knights of the Old Republic and Jade Empire.

[Arkana]

25. The ambient conversations between players are hilarious

Alistair: "So, Sten...what exactly did you do to occupy your time while locked in that cage?"
Sten: "Often I would pose riddles to passersby and offer them gold for correct answers."
Alistair: "Really?"
Sten: "No."

[YOY]

27. Wait until you get Oghren.

He's drunkalicious.

And yes...all the DLC that money could buy...

[Arkana]

31. He likes to watch.

[YOY]

50. He and Morrigan have some great conversations.

Two people with no sense of shame and few morals.

[Mike Daniels]

35. Matching Allistair w/ Morrigan in a group generates some interesting conversations

Usually ending with Morrigan brutally emasculating Allistair by the time it's over.

[Arkana]

72. And Zevran with anyone.

He is, how you say...suave.

[YOY]

73. He is, how you say...not picky.

:+

[NeedleCast]

47. That's my only beef with storyline-shooters

Not a lot of replay value except in multi-player. Give me Fallout 3 anyday. I've sunk 100 hours into that easy and still have fun breaking it out on the weekends.

[freakydeeky]

54. nonsense, no life?

i hate games that take that long, i'll never see the ending:P playing a game for 90 hours generally means you are grinding, doing repetitive mindless bullsh*t like a robotic chimp. hardly a value. if theres 15 hours of quality for 60 bucks thats fine by me. 4 bucks an hour for decent entertainment.

[YOY]

58. Oh I've got a life and a career.

I also don't have 60 Bucks to blow every week or so because I have a life and a career. I'd rather save my bucks and take the family on a vacation or save up for my Daughter's education.

I'd rather play the same game for months or all year than days.

If we hold out for games with more meat...they will make more.

[shadowknows69]

5. A friend of mine was just telling me about this.

He read there's actually a mission where you have to gun down innocent civilians to complete the level. I think I'll pass on this one.

[YOY]

8. Consider that the last one had a mission where you crawl out of a helicoper post nucleur explosion.

And your mission is to crawl from the wreckage and die as the world burns around you.

That was enough for me...pass.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

9. Our society glorifies violence...

...and we wonder why the President is politically ham-strung to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan.

[YOY]

28. Thanks Jack.

How's disbarment?

[Lorien]

55. It does indeed. And if these figures are correct, it will only glorify it more

as time goes by. I'm glad that I don't have kids.

[freakydeeky]

56. wah wah wah....

glorifies violence..please. always the cheap shot at games.

what version of call of duty was hitler playing? oh yea, he was busy admiring the great artistic painters of the ages, wanting to be one himself. if theres any correlation between past times and violence its actually great art that is the problem. the nazi's couldn't get enough of it.

lol

[Nuclear Unicorn]

59. Are you suggesting...

...Hitler did NOT glorify violence?

So he didn't have video games. He had Wagner and he used it to glorify violence anf conflict.

[freakydeeky]

61. lol thats right..

ban classical music.

not sure how the rest of the art collected glorified violence for hitler though;) but correlations correlation!

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

67. You realize the Nazis burned books they found degenerate, right?

Just checking.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

60. Our society glorifies dipshittery...

...and we wonder why Sarah Palin is a best-selling author.

[dorkulon]

66. All societies glorify violence.

Find me a country that doesn't have gunfights/fistfights in their movies. Humans have violent fantasies, period.

[spoony]

75. You're right

but as I've learned in the last few days here, you simply mustn't question the holy sacrament of blowing people away for amusement.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

78. It's not "blowing people away" because there are no people. There are pixels. That's all.

[4lbs]

11. The only reason to play these COD type games is for the online multiplayer.

The single player is relatively thin.

However, why anyone would play a FPS on a console with a gamepad controller is beyond me.

I play online sometimes with a high-powered PC and a keyboard/mouse and destroy most people online that are playing with an Xbox 360. Then I get accused of cheating because of the quick moves I make.

Hmm... me on a dektop PC that gives me 90 fps continually and a keyboard/mouse combo where I can mouselook 360 in a flick of a wrist versus some guy on a console who is getting about 40 fps and takes three seconds to scan all around him. Console frame rates slow down when there's a lot of action. My desktop PC doesn't. Guess who wins that battle?

[TCJ70]

15. Yeah, they shouldn't mix the two...

...comp vs console is no contest really.

[Greyhound]

26. Agreed on all counts. n/t

[trumad]

32. Bingo

It's the best damn game I've ever played.

[CRF450]

36. They mix pc/console multiplayer games??

I played allot of FEAR online, and then one day tried it out on the PS3, bout tossed the controller through the window. Depending on what game it is, I can tolorate some FPS on consoles, but most of them I'll play ONLY on the PC. Mouse and keyboard (or in my case I use a speed pad for FPS games) is the way to go.

Heres an old video of me playing some FEAR online. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VW5FYfxuRw8

[Arkana]

12. I'm getting it on Steam right now.

Hope it runs on my PC.

[TornadoTN]

41. My download just finished - it took forever

Usually get some great speeds, but this one was rough

[WilliamPitt]

14. Seen this?

http://www.theonion.com/content/video/ultra_realistic_modern_warfare?utm_source=video

:)

[TCJ70]

17. I liked the tag at the bottom that says...

..."Single-player campaign will clock in at record 17,250 hours"

[taught_me_patience]

18. I HIGHLY doubt these numbers

I know for a fact that Studios and Developers pump up numbers for press releases. I have no doubt it sold a lot but not 4.7mm units.

[cbdo2007]

19. You're probably right. The real number is probably 4.5 mm units but they just rounded up to 4.7

4.7mm seems reasonable to me. This was a highly anticipated release.

[taught_me_patience]

22. Full disclosure

I work in the home video department of a major studio. I would bet that the true consumer sales number is 3.5MM. This is still TREMENDOUS volume.

[4lbs]

24. If you do the math, the numbers jibe.

$310 million USD in sales.

At $60.00 USD (42 British pounds) per copy + sales tax (making it about $65 USD per game unit).

That comes out to 4,769,230 units sold. There's your 4.7 million.

[piratefish08]

21. Which means about 10 million people have done fuck-all for the last 24 hours

except play video games.

[cbdo2007]

23. I'm sure they all called in sick or are only playing during their lunch breaks.

[vadawg]

65. lol kinda noticed the sick list was heavy today, might explain it..

[tkmorris]

34. Certainly no worse than those watching "American Idol"

People desire to entertain themselves. This is nothing but another way to do that.

[freakydeeky]

57. hey, could be worse... twilight

imagine all the hours wasted spent reading the mind numbing books and watching films of that "saga".;)

[Mari333]

33. how many guys playing this support going to war

makes me wonder. if they do, they should be forced to be in the real thing and get off their parents couches.

ps. I hate these games.

[The Straight Story]

38. I happen to know one of those guys, and he did several tours in Iraq

And my son also likes playing the game, and he is at fort hood and will be heading to Iraq next year (Unless they change things again, originally he was going to Afghanistan next August....).

Games are a good way to release stress IMHO and simply another form of entertainment.

I remember going to see 'Raiders of the lost ark' more times than I am willing to admit here :) it was something I really enjoyed.

Also, back in the day, I wrote several computer games myself I enjoyed playing....

[chrisa]

49. Right...

I hate war, and I have enough sense to realize that it's fake. I also go around massacring people in other games, but it's not real life. You're just shooting pixels on a screen.

People should play something first before they bash it.

[Forkboy]

53. It's a GAME.

My favorite genre of games is strategy, turn based wargames (nothing like this shooter...wargames are more like tabletop games), yet I'm totally anti-war. You know why...because I can tell the difference between real life and make believe.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

77. I dunno. My husband bought Left 4 Dead and now he supports a Zombie Apocalypse

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

62. Wasn't your kid at Abu Ghraib?

:shrug:

[dorkulon]

68. I love these games, and I hate war.

It's not war. It's a fantasy. It's easy to tell the difference, because when the video game ends, nobody is actually dead.

[Arkana]

69. That's your prerogative then.

I've played every Grand Theft Auto game in existence, and I JUST finished this one--and guess what? I still know I probably shouldn't walk into an airport with a machine gun and shoot everyone in it.

[anigbrowl]

70. Probably the same %age as the general population

I like shooting video games some of the time, but it has little or nothing to do with my political outlook. I don't think there's any evidence for your inference.

[Romulox]

83. This post is nonsensical. People who support the wars should be forced to ship out, period.

This game has not a whit to do with it. :hi:

[LanternWaste]

37. The New and Improved Opiates of the Masses...

The New and Improved Opiates of the Masses.


Religion and television are just so 19th and 20th century...

[NeedleCast]

45. Yeah, No Fun Allowed!

Stupid distractions. Until all mankinds problems are solved, no fun for anyone!

[LanternWaste]

63. All sacred cows it would seem.

TV, Religion, PC Games... six of one, half a dozen of the other is all. If one is denied til all problems are solved, then all are.

All sacred cows it would seem.

[anigbrowl]

71. Dog, meet manger .nt

[NeedleCast]

74. Luckily we have you, arbiter of the masses

To tell us all how we're just sheep to the slaughter.

What would we do without you...

[Romulox]

81. It's always gratifying when someone one strongly disagrees with makes so little sense! nt

[YOY]

48. Yet some of us find time to better our community. I guess we can handle our 'opiate' well.

n.t.

[LanternWaste]

76. I imagine that happened as well with both...

I imagine that happened as well with both television and religion, all anecdotal observances aside.

[NeedleCast]

44. I have to wait until Saturday

Bummer.

[chrisa]

46. Great game.

Almost finished with the campaign. The airport level was hillarious (come on, GTA IV is much worse).

I also love the plot, Red Dawn reference, and how dark the story telling is, as compared to the first one.

[MilesColtrane]

64. Hmm...watching a walkthrough of the airport mission...

"hilarious" didn't come to my mind.

[whatchamacallit]

79. It's very cool and we love our buddies at Infinity Ward, but we're gonna sweep the GOTY awards

http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/ps3/uncharted2amongthieves
http://www.naughtydog.com/

:)

[SemiCharmedQuark]

80. That game is face-melting awesomeness.

I rarely get into video games, but I love Uncharted.

[whatchamacallit]

84. Thanks SemiCharmedQuark! n/t

[Romulox]

82. All this negative controversy kinda makes me want this game...

I'm not morally offended by the controversial levels. In fact, exploring one's dark side in a game can always be fun...

[chrisa]

85. Just beat this on "Hardened."

Time for a Veteran, 100% playthrough (all intel, all levels). Has anybody done that yet? It's going to be hell.

[Orwellian_Ghost]

86. The United States of Violence

Days after the November 2004 election, while U.S. troops again moved into Fallujah for the slaughter, a dispatch from that city reported on the front page of the New York Times: “Nothing here makes sense, but the Americans’ superior training and firepower eventually seem to prevail.”

Superior violence, according to countless scripts, was righteous and viscerally satisfying. Television and movies, ever since childhood, presented greater violence as the ultimate weapon and final fix, uniquely able to put an end to conflict. Leaving menace for dead — you couldn’t beat that. But at home in the USA and far away, the practical and moral failures of violence became irrefutable. In Iraq, sources of unauthorized violence met with escalating American violence. In the United States, war opponents met with presidential contempt.

In a short story, published one hundred years ago, William Dean Howells wrote: “What a thing it is to have a country that can’t be wrong, but if it is, is right, anyway!”

http://www.atlanticfreepress.com/news/1/2651-the-united-states-of-violence.html