World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Becomes Fastest-Selling PC Game of All Time

[btarunr]

Starting November 23, World of Warcraft players around the globe began their journey into the unknown reaches of Azeroth's afterlife in Shadowlands, the game's highly anticipated eighth expansion. Today, Blizzard Entertainment announced that as of the first full day of Shadowlands' launch, more than 3.7 million units had sold through globally, making it the fastest-selling PC game of all time industry-wide.

The previously announced industry record-holder, Blizzard's own Diablo III, sold through more than 3.5 million copies as of its first day of release. Today's announcement confirms that Shadowlands has surpassed that milestone as well as any other reported sell-through achievement for the same time frame among all PC games historically.



In addition, World of Warcraft has continued to see strong engagement from the global community franchise-wide:

• In the months leading up to the expansion's release and the time since launch, the game reached and has sustained its highest number of players on monthly or longer-term subscriptions compared to the same period ahead of and following any WoW expansion in the past decade, in both the West and the East.
• Players have spent more time in Azeroth year to date than in the same period of any of the last 10 years.
• In addition, total player time in game this year to date has nearly doubled compared to the same period last year.

"It's been a huge thrill to enter this whole-new dimension of the Warcraft universe together with millions of players around the world," said J. Allen Brack, president of Blizzard Entertainment. "It's been equally rewarding to see players enjoying all of the new features and content in Shadowlands—whether they're exploring new aspects of their characters with the Covenants or setting foot in WoW for the first time with the new-player experience in Exile's Reach—and there's much more to come."

The launch of Shadowlands is just the beginning of an adventure unlike anything ever before experienced in World of Warcraft, with much more in store for players in the weeks and months ahead. Starting today, Shadowlands Season 1 commences when the gates to the expansion's first raid, Castle Nathria—the gothic stronghold of Revendreth—open in Normal and Heroic difficulties. Mythic Keystone dungeons will also become available, tempting Azeroth's heroes with greater rewards for taking on increased challenges. This season's dungeon affix, Prideful, turns heroes' own sense of accomplishment against them in the form of ego-wrought manifestations. In addition, players will be able to put their skills to the ultimate test in Arenas and Battlegrounds as the expansion's first Rated PvP season begins.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[ocugh]

SL release has been delayed due to COVID. Even before that it was on presale much earlier than the initially planned release date.

Is Blizzard trying to run one past the media by trying to pass off sales numbers as all fitting within a 1 day timespan instead of the some many months it actually took place over?

3.7 Million sales isn't a small number. How does it compare to previous WoW expansions? I find it hard to trust cherry picked numbers coming from a company that stopped releasing subscriber numbers to hide a decline.

 

[Rowsol]

People still play this? I quit half way through WotLK.

 

[Mescalamba]

WoW? Bit like insanity exercise. Trying same thing over and over and expecting different outcome.

 

[Vya Domus]

Has it ?

I feel like I live in a parallel world, I am staggered this many people still play it. Mind you there is always an influx of players when a new expansion comes out and immediately after the player base falls of a cliff.

 

[Harthad]

WoW? Bit like insanity exercise. Trying same thing over and over and expecting different outcome.

Just because you read the definition of insanity somewhere, doesn't mean it applies to everyone playing Wow, since there are so many things to do in this game.
Or maybe you tried the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome and came to us to preach your experience ?

 

[Deleted member 24505]

I played WoW for years, enjoyed it, it is very sociable if you find a good group. not bought SL though.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Good grief. I haven't played WOW since 2012... Can't understand why it's still going...

 

[silentbogo]

Can't understand why it's still going...

Well, same with anything really... All the best-sellers from 10-15 years ago are still going strong. Just look at CS, TF2, Dota, Lineage, Guild Wars.
You only think that, cause WoW hasn't really been that popular in EU and CIS to begin with. It never gave up position in US throughout all these years, only fluctuated user activity between expansion releases. Habit is a hard thing to change, even an outdated and expensive subscription-based model with a hefty entry price can't change that.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Well, same with anything really... All the best-sellers from 10-15 years ago are still going strong. Just look at CS, TF2, Dota, Lineage, Guild Wars.
You only think that, cause WoW hasn't really been that popular in EU and CIS to begin with. It never gave up position in US throughout all these years, only fluctuated user activity between expansion releases. Habit is a hard thing to change, even an outdated and expensive subscription-based model with a hefty entry price can't change that.

It just doesn't have anything to offer...

 

[arczi19]

Good grief. I haven't played WOW since 2012... Can't understand why it's still going...

I think its very easy to see why its still going. Has lots of players + makes lots of money. No reason why it wouldnt be going.

 

[theGryphon]

I think its very easy to see why its still going. Has lots of players + makes lots of money. No reason why it wouldnt be going.

I think he was referring to the players, not Blizzard.

I think it's about the comfort zone for most people. After having played a long time, they feel attached and find it daunting to invest similar time to learn another game.

 

[neatfeatguy]

I played WoW for about the first six months it was out....was pretty boring in my opinion. I tried it again just about the time the first expansion released and jewelry crafting was released. I hoarded ores and gems from the start of the game and when jewelry crafting came out I ended up with hundreds of thousands of gold for the massive upcharge ores and gems went for - that was kind of fun, but I had nothing in game I needed so the gold just sat there on my account.

Surprisingly, I really didn't put much time into the game. I wasn't all that impressed with it. I guess I just liked the idea of WoW and not really what it had to offer in terms of value. I tried joining several different guilds - usually met with the same results when we'd try PvP for capture the flag....no one on my side knew how to work together. They all just ran around doing whatever the hell they wanted and we'd just get crushed....a lot of negativity and meanness between the players. I found it more entertaining playing the game solo instead of dealing with a bunch of ass hats.

I'm surprised some folks are still into this game after all these years, that's some serious dedication.

 

[ODOGG26]

Used to play WoW a lot as well. Really stopped after the guild I was in defeated WOTLK. Fun times but like many said, it just got repetitive and time consuming. That's the only game I spent that much time and years into. Nowadays there aren't any games that can get that kind of time from me. LoL did for a while but I play that sparingly now.

 

[amit_talkin]

being a PC gamer since 1998, I have never played single WOW game so far.

 

[katzi]

I've been playing WoW since Vanilla, quit till BC launch, came back for that, and have been playing daily since

It'd also eat you guys up knowing the overkill hardware I play it on too *cackles*

 

[CrAsHnBuRnXp]

People still play this? I quit half way through WotLK.

This is the best expansion since WotLK.

being a PC gamer since 1998, I have never played single WOW game so far.

Youre missing out.

I played WoW for about the first six months it was out....was pretty boring in my opinion. I tried it again just about the time the first expansion released and jewelry crafting was released. I hoarded ores and gems from the start of the game and when jewelry crafting came out I ended up with hundreds of thousands of gold for the massive upcharge ores and gems went for - that was kind of fun, but I had nothing in game I needed so the gold just sat there on my account.

Surprisingly, I really didn't put much time into the game. I wasn't all that impressed with it. I guess I just liked the idea of WoW and not really what it had to offer in terms of value. I tried joining several different guilds - usually met with the same results when we'd try PvP for capture the flag....no one on my side knew how to work together. They all just ran around doing whatever the hell they wanted and we'd just get crushed....a lot of negativity and meanness between the players. I found it more entertaining playing the game solo instead of dealing with a bunch of ass hats.

I'm surprised some folks are still into this game after all these years, that's some serious dedication.

Ive been playing the game since two months before wrath came out. It's def had it's ups and downs and i have quit the game from time to time when there was a large content drought, but overall the game is quite fun. Unlimited dailies, run older content for transmog, battlegrounds, arenas, rated battlegrounds, world quests just to name a few. The game is quite fun. Im glad i didnt play the game back in Vanilla because I agree, it was quite boring, because the game was so slow paced. But there has been a lot of changes for QoL and the faster game play is def more my style.

 

[Vayra86]

WoW? Bit like insanity exercise. Trying same thing over and over and expecting different outcome.

Has it ?

I feel like I live in a parallel world, I am staggered this many people still play it. Mind you there is always an influx of players when a new expansion comes out and immediately after the player base falls of a cliff.

Great observations both if you ask me. And yet....

Played vanilla until WOTLK came out, sold account. Started playing again with Legion and burned out from it with the last content updates for it... Never finished the whole xpacs dungeons. It is indeed more of the same. It still has some spark in it from vanilla but most of that unique atmosphere is just gone and it cannot be revived. That is why so many moved to private legacy servers...

But the thing is, WoW still has the best gameplay mechanics, game loops, and designs all rolled into a single MMO backed by great servers and support plus the absolute best and biggest lore base you can find in any of them. Blizzard built that up in its glory days and most of that is still preserved even if all those world maps are now deserted.

After WoW vanilla I explicitly looked for MMOs with similar magic but honestly I never found it. And I played a few dozen of them, mind, many hundreds of farm hours later I can still arrive in WoW snd enjoy it for what it is, albeit briefly. Other MMOs also shine but in their own way and more often than not, partly hecause they borrow concepts from WoW.

The whole quest marker system and multiple other ideas are now commonplace in almost every game.

 

[Lucas_]

preorder it like 6 months ago, until yet didnt open it ... no time ... lol

 

[z1n0x]

Played since Vanilla with lots of on and offs. SL is the first expansion i didn't bought and have no desire to. I'd like to thank Blizz of helping me get over the WoW addiction with their horrible design decisions.
Disappointed Lone Wolf Marksman, happier and healthier human.

 

[Deleted member 190774]

It just doesn't have anything to offer...

That is of course your opinion.

Although I stopped playing 3 or 4 years ago, and had several years break in between stints, I racked up over 500K PvP kills and 10K Arena matches and around 500 days played. There was obviously something for me...

 

[lexluthermiester]

With the release of Cyberpunk2077, I wonder if Blizzard is about to lose this crown...

 

[Mescalamba]

That is of course your opinion.

Although I stopped playing 3 or 4 years ago, and had several years break in between stints, I racked up over 500K PvP kills and 10K Arena matches and around 500 days played. There was obviously something for me...

Enjoyed that quite a bit too. Missed world PvP most, when Blizz effectively killed it.. Well, they kinda killed whole world everything, since last time I checked everyone was sitting somewhere safe waiting in queue for raid/dung etc.

Great observations both if you ask me. And yet....

Played vanilla until WOTLK came out, sold account. Started playing again with Legion and burned out from it with the last content updates for it... Never finished the whole xpacs dungeons. It is indeed more of the same. It still has some spark in it from vanilla but most of that unique atmosphere is just gone and it cannot be revived. That is why so many moved to private legacy servers...

But the thing is, WoW still has the best gameplay mechanics, game loops, and designs all rolled into a single MMO backed by great servers and support plus the absolute best and biggest lore base you can find in any of them. Blizzard built that up in its glory days and most of that is still preserved even if all those world maps are now deserted.

After WoW vanilla I explicitly looked for MMOs with similar magic but honestly I never found it. And I played a few dozen of them, mind, many hundreds of farm hours later I can still arrive in WoW snd enjoy it for what it is, albeit briefly. Other MMOs also shine but in their own way and more often than not, partly hecause they borrow concepts from WoW.

The whole quest marker system and multiple other ideas are now commonplace in almost every game.

Ive quit after WoTLK. Still have physical copy of Cata and I think my account ends with Legion, didnt check for long time. Came back couple of times, but for me WoW was vanilla and TBC. Thought about going back to "classic", but it took few glances on reddit to check its state and just meh out of it.

Only MMO I found somewhat okay, even while completely different was TESO (or ESO), but that was before F2P. Quit that exactly at that point.

Still kinda miss WoW I remember.. but its impossible to get back to it, no longer exists. Specific mixture of game and time.

With the release of Cyberpunk2077, I wonder if Blizzard is about to lose this crown...

For most bugs in game?

 

[lexluthermiester]

For most bugs in game?

What?

 

[lexluthermiester]

Seems like CyberPunk2077 just smashed Blizzard's record, as predicted.

Cyberpunk 2077 huge on the PC, biggest PC game launch EVER

CD PROJEKT RED sees gigantic success on the PC with Cyberpunk 2077 -- 59% of the 8 million pre-orders were from PC gamers.

www.tweaktown.com