It pays to be a multi-platform release if you’re Activision. The video game studio behind Call of Duty continues to break records with its yearly installments. For its latest first-person shooter, a sequel to 2009’s Modern Warfare 2, the game set a new record for the biggest product launch of all time.
In a 24-hour period, 6.5 million copies of the game were sold in the U.S. and U.K., earning $400 million as a result.
The earnings top the $360 million Call of Duty: Black Ops made in 2010, and $310 million MW2 took in two years ago.
“We believe the launch of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is the biggest entertainment launch of all time in any medium, and we achieved this record with sales from only two territories,” said Bobby Kotick, CEO of Activision Blizzard. “Other than Call of Duty, there has never been another entertainment franchise that has set opening day records three years in a row.”
Kotick also points out that overall sales for the Call of Duty franchise now “exceed worldwide theatrical box office for Star Wars and Lord of the Rings, two of the most successful entertainment franchises of all time.”
Give it a few years and the gaming franchise will likely exceed the worldwide B.O. of the Harry Potter films.
With the announcement of Modern Warfare 3‘s first day sales record is the notice that Activision also donated $3 million to the Call of Duty Endowment, a non-profit corporation that seeks to provide job placement and training for veterans.
