CoD: Black Ops II Breaks $500 Million Mark in One Day

By Kevin Parrish
published

Black Ops II made over $500 million in the first twenty-four hours of its release.

Activision said on Friday that Call of Duty: Black Ops II achieved an estimated sell-through of more than $500 million worldwide in the first 24 hours of its release. Even more, this release marked the fourth consecutive year that its Call of Duty franchise has delivered the biggest entertainment launch of the year.

"With first day sales of over half a billion dollars worldwide, we believe Call of Duty is the biggest entertainment launch of the year for the fourth year in a row," said Bobby Kotick, CEO, Activision Blizzard, Inc.

According to Kotick, life-to-date sales for the Call of Duty franchise have exceeded worldwide theatrical box office receipts for "Harry Potter" and "Star Wars," the two most successful movie franchises of all time. Still, the publisher remains cautious about what lies ahead in 2013 and beyond.

"Given the challenged macro-economic environment, we remain cautious about the balance of 2012 and 2013," he said.

Million of fans attended more than 16,000 midnight openings at retail stores worldwide on November 13, the company said. The game even supposedly drove social conversation in its first 24 hours, as it was a top trending topic globally on Twitter in 23 cities worldwide.

"Call of Duty has become more than a product people buy, it's become a brand people buy into.  And every November we do more than just launch a game, we kick off an annual, unofficial but worldwide phenomenon called Call of Duty season," said Eric Hirshberg, CEO of Activision Publishing. 

Call of Duty: Black Ops II is available worldwide on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Windows PC. The game will also be made available on the Nintendo Wii U console on November 18, 2012. For more information about Black Ops II, head here.

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Kevin Parrish
43 Comments Comment from the forums
  • boyabunda
    Evidence? I don't believe this. This is just marketing by Activision.
    Reply
  • edogawa
    I know there's going to be a lot of anti-COD comments in here, but I bought BO2, I am actually having fun playing it on the PC. I like to play it at the end of the day, it's quick to get a game, and not hard to play; it's a good casual shooter.
    Reply
  • DroKing
    Still a stupid casual friendly game. Next please.
    Reply
  • A Bad Day
    I'm still trying to understand how CoD is such a successful brand despite some negativity. Not sure if studying how it's successful would help me publish an interesting mobile app game (will be ported to desktop first, then to the mobile devices).
    Reply
  • aznshinobi
    I'll be honest, COD games get a bunch of **** but at the end of the day, it's a game that many people will buy which make the community huge, and on the consoles, that's what makes it really fun tbh. Sure it doesn't take much skill, but that's what makes it so fun, at least in my opinion. I do like BF3 more, but it's not for everyone meaning the large scale FPS maps.
    Reply
  • A Bad Day
    edogawaYou need to find the right target group for your game an advertise to them; that's probably your best bet.
    The question, how do I interest them? How do I convince them that it's not another "me-too!" or some cash-cow scam?
    Reply
  • Pinhedd
    A Bad DayI'm still trying to understand how CoD is such a successful brand despite some negativity. Not sure if studying how it's successful would help me publish an interesting mobile app game (will be ported to desktop first, then to the mobile devices).
    Activision's marketing team is incredible. It's easy to sell CoD because CoD has a history of delivering exactly what is promised. CoD is a fairly shallow series as far as gameplay goes but it's energetic and story driven, which are very appealing elements for gamers who don't spend 8-12 hour stretches playing games at a time and simply want some brainless fun.

    There's an age old saying which is very, very applicable here:

    If it isn't broken, don't fix it
    EA has consistently made this mistake and has driven many franchises into the ground as a result. Activision does not make this mistake, and has been setting records as a result. The CoD formula is well established and hasn't changed at all since CoD 2.

    Most of the negativity leveled at CoD comes from hardcore gamers who won't play it anyway.
    Reply
  • DirectXtreme
    A Bad DayI'm still trying to understand how CoD is such a successful brand despite some negativity. Not sure if studying how it's successful would help me publish an interesting mobile app game (will be ported to desktop first, then to the mobile devices).Call of Duty is successful because of the following factors:
    1. It's accessible - a key ingredient to making a game successful is to make it n00b/idiot-friendly. This is the biggest reason Call of Duty is so successful, it caters to people who previously weren't gamers or who are gamers that don't want to play a challenging game (AKA casuals).
    2. It's mass marketed - Spend 9/10 (exaggeration, probably) of your game development budget on hyping up the game through marketing and advertising with advertisements that will give the player a sense of how much of a bad*** they are when they will be playing the game. This strategy is effective when you have built up a legion of sheepish customers who will buy your next big game no matter what.
    3. Its developers are lazy - Use the source code of an ancient, irrelevant engine, tweak it a little, copy and paste anywhere from 10-75% the assets from the previous game you made with that engine, tweak them, and release the (un)finished package (parts of the game will be made available later, but for purchase as DLC). This strategy saves time and money that would otherwise be allocated into developing new game assets.
    Reply
  • madjimms
    And not a single shit was given (by me)
    Reply
  • nitrium
    Activision's marketing team is second only Apple's.
    aka "the new iCOD".
    Reply