As easy as 1.23 million: Modern Warfare 2 breaks first-day UK sales record

by Ludwig Kietzmann on Nov 11th 2009 1:29PM

Citing "astonishing" first-day sales figures in the UK, the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association has trumpeted Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's debut as a sign that "interactive entertainment has completely come of age." Said Michael Rawlinson, Director General of the ELSPA: "These first day sales figures are astonishing and clear evidence that video games are now mainstream in the UK."

Smashing through the estimated 631,000 units sold by 2008's Grand Theft Auto IV, Infinity Ward's slick shooter grossed £47 million (roughly $78.3 million) in first-day sales, which ELSPA and GFK-ChartTrack pair with 1.23 million units sold. Sold to adults, of course! "So, as an 18-rated video game, it is important that this game is not played by children, and parents should be appropriately vigilant," said Rawlinson. "We ask everyone to make sure they check the packaging of games to ensure they are suitable for their players, especially as we enter the festive season when video games are one of the most popular gifts of the holiday."

We hope you don't take offense, people of the UK, but some of you have awfully high-pitched voices online.

Tags: activision, call-of-duty, call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2, chart-track, elspa, fps, infinity-ward, Microsoft, modern-warfare-2, uk, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (92)

Surprise!

owait..

I don't think anything is starting.

Really, it should be the World vs. Russia. I seended what them damn commies did yesterday!

@We hope you don't take offense, people of the UK, but some of you have awfully high-pitched voices online.

It's so true, however this is when they do talk. Check out Valve's comment on why UK players need to talk more.

I'd say a lot of Americans could do with talking LESS. How do constant singing, homophobia, racism and general insults contribute positively to an online community?

And IW deserves every penny. Awesome game!

I LOVE CANADA! CANADA ROCKS THE SOCKS OFF OUR COCKS!

What's Canada?

It's a magical place where everybody is awesome and leprechauns ride unicorns for breakfast.

Duh~!

the article writer isnt saying anything about the uk public having high pitched voices specifically, it just saying that little kids have high pitched voices in general, this is regardless of where they live.

Then why Does it say 'People of the Uk'.. ?

That's fucking ridiculous. UK alone? Christ. Now I really want to see global sales...

This does translate to the statistic that 2% of the UK population bought MW2 yesterday.

Canadians are pleasant people.
Americans... well, where do I start?

:D

Asians can't drive, Jews are greedy, and the Irish love alcohol.

Don't get me started on the damn Poles...

Belgians are the worst.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knwwgZNeIpA

Also, I'm aware of the irony that I've posted a clip from a British television show.

I really need to work on my sarcasm. That last sentence wasnt sarcasm.

Cmon people, joystiq was just commenting on the inconsistencies of what was asked of the UK from their political leaders and what joystiq is noticing online... I'm sure they hate all whiney kids! We all do!

We hate whiney kid Americans, Brits, Africans, Asians, Australians, (South) Americans, other Europeans, Antarcticans, ALL THE LITTLE WHINEY PEOPLE OF THE WORLD!

We should unite in that hate... CMON!

ditto on the global sales...10 million anyone?

That last part sounds like magical fetish porn.

You forget about all the people with modded 360s who went to all the trouble of downloading the copy of MW2 when it came out a week before the official release and then found their Xboxs banned from Xbox Live as of the official MW2 release date :D

Tbf Joystiq, With Your Final Comment, i Could say That i Hear Alot More High Pitched Americans Than English People. So Cheers for the Unappropriate Comment on That 1. Fucktards.

*laughs* he said Unappropriate

way to make your case

Why do you feel the need to capitalize the first letter of every word?

1st Comment,, Haha, i Never Noticed That to be Fair.. *Inappropriate.. :P

2nd Comment,, It's Just how i was Brought up Writing Like.. Every 4+ Letter Word Gets a Capital Letter Start

Ludwig,

You said what is on a lot of peoples minds and you did it with class. Underage gaming is a wide spread problem and let add to that SINGING for no reason online in my ear out out tune. Then there is the using vulgar language that most have no idea what it really means. I commend you sir

Can we get an Adult Swim playlist? That would be nice.

Wow, even with the MASSIVE boycott by PC gamers?

Annoyingly high pitched voices?

Are you sure you arent playing against your American counterparts because I havnt heard no Brits like that, Yanks on the other hand... Live is Rife with them...

As said above, at least we dont kill our own/allies soldiers. We might pay alot for petrol but the pound is stronger than the dollar and the reason we are paying loads is because your government decided to invade another country to get more oil thus creating the mess we are in now.

Whilst I can admit, we are foolish Brits for following you wherever you go, Ill also admit that if your country and its leaders werent so backstabingly aggressive and incoherant and my/our country wasnt so small we would have finished you off by now.

You have been an independent for 300ish years and look at what you have achieved, a large body count?

Dont worry though, soon Europe will band together and expose you for what you are. It will suck though, you guys got some awesome people over there who dont deserve :(

Dude, fuck off. Europe is a broken down shell of countries. You guys blew your load trying to stave off internal problems.

Friendly Fire wasn't invented by the US, moron.

I suppose the fact that we haven't tried to dominate and enslave the world the way Bloody Old England did means we're a failure?

Also, if we invaded Iraq for the oil...how come foreign companies are getting the contracts?

Fuck you, Dao. Take your antiquated English inferiority complex elsewhere. What kind of fucked up bullshit country has a royal family anymore? You pussies still need a king, we got over that shit 235 years ago. Okay, we invaded another country for oil. So fucking what? Can you think of a better reason to invade another country? At least we didn't invade them for: spices, jewels, slave trafficking, empire building, etc. Not like jolly ol' England, right Guv'nor?

@ Darth Bradwart

Why, Canada is the proprietor of that delicious, dry ginger ale, silly!

I work at a school, and every single teenage male with a 360 or PS3 now has this game.

Could do with more normal gaming comments and less of Darth Bradwart's delusional and uninformed 1980's-esque US propaganda.

I wonder what percentage of these sales were the PC version?

Well i was in Asda where i got my copy from. And they sold out of there 400 xbox copies. they had a few of the 400 ps3 copies they got in and they only ordered 6 for PC and they still had 2 left.

"off topic" anyone else think this lady is a fuc ing head job looking for shit to talk about .

http://www.industrygamers.com/news/modern-warfare-2-declared-barbaric-and-harmful-by-columnist/

A sad sad day when this kind of SHIT is considered the 'zenith' and the apex of all we can achieve in the gaming industry.

When will people realise these games shattering sales records do so NOT because they are good, but because they had BETTER marketing and usually because the money went ON the marketing rather than the development of the game.

This is a terrible episode in the game industries' history, and all those who bought it (and didn't make up for that fact by slating it on metacritic/gamespot etc) deserve nothing but mediocre shit packaged up for attention deficit teens from now.

You are voting when you buy this crap, and it IS crap, it's worse than COD4 and that was crap. Applies to all versions, no matter PC, PS3, 360.. you have all been shafted and IW are laughing at the millions of £/$/Etc they've effectively just conned you out of.

Industry heading for a crash when shit like this keeps happening, look at the music industry... it will return to grass roots and grow again through innovation and player focus, not marketing and hype.

I'm ashamed to even be a gamer today.

I will not be spending $60 on a six hour single player game and worthless multiplayer.

Could have done much better IW if you had done the PC version correctly.

Funny, the only high pitched voices I've heard online have been American...no offence.

Previous 50 Comments

As easy as 1.23 million: Modern Warfare 2 breaks first-day UK sales record

Reader Comments (92)

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