WoW: CHA-CHING! 24 Hour Sales Record

The World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, has become, according to Blizzard, the fastest selling game of all time. In the first 24 hours of its availability, WotLK sold over 2.8 MILLION copies. Check out the official word on it:

With more than 2.8 million copies sold in its first 24 hours, Blizzard Entertainment®'s second World of Warcraft expansion is now the fastest-selling PC game ever

IRVINE, Calif. - November 20, 2008 - Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced that World of Warcraft®'s second expansion, Wrath of the Lich King™, has sold more than 2.8 million copies in its first 24 hours of availability*, making it the fastest-selling PC game of all time. This eclipses the previous record of nearly 2.4 million copies sold in 24 hours, set in January 2007 by Blizzard's first World of Warcraft expansion, The Burning Crusade®. Wrath of the Lich King was simultaneously released in North America, Europe, Chile, Argentina, and Russia on November 13; Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand on November 14; and South Korea and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau on November 18.

In celebration of the launch, more than 15,000 stores throughout the world had their doors open at midnight to welcome thousands of expectant players. Several of these locations were attended by Blizzard Entertainment representatives, who met players and signed copies of the game.

"We're grateful for the incredible support that players around the world have continued to show for World of Warcraft," said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. "Wrath of the Lich King contains some of the best content we've created for the game so far, and we look forward to seeing even more players log in to experience it in the days ahead."

"World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King surpassed all sales expectations, with 100 Gamestation stores opening at midnight to cater for a high level of demand," said Andrew Thompson, product director, Gamestation UK. "Players queued for hours - some dressed as characters from the game - proving that enthusiasm for Blizzard Entertainment's latest installment is at its highest level to date."

Prior to the launch of Wrath of the Lich King, World of Warcraft's subscriber population had grown to more than 11 million players, further strengthening its position as the world's most popular subscription-based massively multiplayer online role-playing game. More information about the new expansion can be found at the official Wrath of the Lich King website: www.wow-europe.com/wrath

Kudos on those huge numbers....now what does that translate to in dollars? Mathematicians? Have at it!

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Impressive numbers but
Still out of 11 mil players that is only 25% for now

...and that was only the first 24 hours. :)

And it didn't count Asia, where easily half of their market is.

2.8 million x $40 = $112 million (assuming NO ONE bought the collector's edition)

$112 mil in 24 hours = $4.667 million per hour. I wish I could make that kind of wages.

It's a big number, but we expect that from WoW. :p