Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 proves that despite rather horrific overall user scores, hype still sells in droves. Modern Warfare 3 has broken all five-day entertainment records by grossing more than $775 million worldwide, surpassing theatrical box office, book, and video game sales records.
The game has also broken a few Xbox Live records, including having more than 7 million multiplayer hours logged by the end of the launch day, more than 3.3 million unique gamers on launch day, and for concurrent players online with 3.3 million users on November 8th.
It should be noted that these records surpassed the previous record breaker by fairly considerable margins. The previous record holder? Call of Duty: Black Ops. Before that? Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. It should also be noted that the price for just the vanilla version of Modern Warfare 3 is roughly 4-5 times the amount of a movie ticket.
"With $775 million of sales of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 in its first five days, Call of Duty has become the first entertainment property in history to set five-day launch records for three consecutive years across all forms of entertainment," said Robert Kotick, CEO, Activision Blizzard. "Life-to-date retail sales for the Call of Duty franchise have exceeded $6 billion worldwide, which makes Call of Duty one of the most valuable entertainment properties in the world. We expect continued sales momentum, as reviews and audience enthusiasm suggest that this is the best Call of Duty game that we have ever made. Online play for Modern Warfare 3 is at record levels and we continue to see high online play for both Call of Duty: Black Ops and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which ranked as the #2 and #4 top-played Xbox LIVE games for the week of November 7, according to Major Nelson."
"As I have said all year, we have been singluarly focused on making a spectacular game for our fans, and nothing else. Our incredible teams at Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer Games have done just that," said Eric Hirshberg, CEO, Activision Publishing. "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 continues to thrill core gaming enthusiasts as well as draw new people into the medium, which is not an easy balancing act. But it takes more than a great game. I would also like to thank our incredible team for the pulling off the launch of the year, as well as our retail partners around the world. But most of all, I want to thank our fans. They are our toughest critics, and our biggest supporters, and none of this would be possible without them."
"As I have said all year, we have been singluarly focused on making a spectacular game for our fans, and nothing else. Our incredible teams at Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer Games have done just that," said Eric Hirshberg, CEO, Activision Publishing. "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 continues to thrill core gaming enthusiasts as well as draw new people into the medium, which is not an easy balancing act. But it takes more than a great game. I would also like to thank our incredible team for the pulling off the launch of the year, as well as our retail partners around the world. But most of all, I want to thank our fans. They are our toughest critics, and our biggest supporters, and none of this would be possible without them."
The game has also broken a few Xbox Live records, including having more than 7 million multiplayer hours logged by the end of the launch day, more than 3.3 million unique gamers on launch day, and for concurrent players online with 3.3 million users on November 8th.
It should be noted that these records surpassed the previous record breaker by fairly considerable margins. The previous record holder? Call of Duty: Black Ops. Before that? Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. It should also be noted that the price for just the vanilla version of Modern Warfare 3 is roughly 4-5 times the amount of a movie ticket.