Black Ops II Scores Half a Million in Its First Day on Sale
To the absolute surprise of no one, Call of Duty: Black Ops II earned just over $500 million bucks worldwide within its first twenty-four hours on sale. Following a sales one-upping trend started by Infinity Ward’s Modern Warfare 2, Black Ops II has toppled last year’s MW3 launch numbers which totaled in $400 million.
Activision immediately patted themselves on the shoulder for doling out another annual blockbuster. Acti’s own CEO, Bobby Kotick, heralded the Call of Duty license as “the biggest entertainment launch of the year for the fourth year in a row,” adding that life-to-date sales far exceed even the number of box office ticket sales amassed for cultural smash hits like Star Wars and Harry Potter. Black Ops II’s earnings aren’t staggering for lack of industry competition, either. Just last week Microsoft’s gaming juggernaut, Halo 4, saw an impressive launch day gross of $220 million.
One has to wonder how different these launch numbers would look if Halo weren’t limited to the Xbox, but as it stands, both titles seem poised to outsell their way to Holiday supremacy this year and, more importantly, allow Activision to remodel its corporate headquarters into a flying fortress above the clouds. (At the time of this writing, Microsoft has not announced any plans for flying cities; we’ll keep you posted as we hear word).