World of Warcraft Cataclysm Record Sales

Blizzard Entertainment released its first-week sales records today and is claiming top spot for the most sales of a game in 24 hours with the World of Warcraft expansion, Cataclysm.  For those gamers trying to keep track of this stuff, it was only three weeks ago that Activision claimed it hit an all-time high of weekly sales with Call of Duty: Black Ops.  Just to be clear, Black Ops is presently holding the top spot for biggest gross sales in the first week, while Cataclysm is claiming rights to most numbers sold in 24 hours.  The previous best for numbers of games sold in 24 hours was held by another World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King.  Wrath of the Lich King had sold more than 2.8 million copies in its first 24 hours, which released in November 2008.

The numbers were compiled through internal figures as well as those reported by distributors, and included pre-sales purchases as well as first day purchases.  Cataclysm was simultaneously released in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Europe, Russia, Southeast Asia, Australia, and New Zealand on December 7 , and became available in Korea and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau on December 9 .

In addition to digital downloads, more than 10,000 stores worldwide celebrated the launch by opening on midnight to let players purchase physical copies of the game.  Certain retailers hosted special launch parties which were attended by an estimated 15,000 gamers across in the US, Canada, France, Germany, Russia, Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain, the UK, and Taiwan .

"We had to bring Azeroth to the brink of destruction in Cataclysm, but the result was our best expansion yet," said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment . "We want to thank all of our new, existing, and returning players throughout the world for their incredible enthusiasm and support, and we look forward to hearing what they think about all the new content."

"World of Warcraft: Cataclysm delivered even bigger day-one sales than we experienced with StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty in July," said Bob McKenzie, senior vice president of merchandising at GameStop, "making this a record year for Blizzard Entertainment at GameStop."

There are now approximately 12 million gamers worldwide playing some form of World of Warcraft.   More information about Cataclysm can be found here: http://www.blizzard.com/games/cataclysm/