COD Black Ops

UPDATE: COD Black Ops tops $650M. We had originally flipped the numbers for COD 2 and COD Black Ops.

Call of Duty 2 earned the record for an entertainment product and grossed $310 million in the first 24 hours of its launch, while COD Black Ops cracked 360M in it’s first 24 hours.

Call of Duty: Black Ops, the new chapter in the series not only has the record for sales in first week, beating sales of $100 million belonging to Modern Warfare 2, (which grossed $550 million), but even beat the movie Avatar which reached the $500 million mark after a month in theaters.

COD Black Ops sales are even more extraordinary, especially considering Activision Blizzard CEO Robert Kotick had predicted a drop in sales of new video games by 20% from the previous chapter.

It should be noted that, compared to films, video games act like sprinters, capable of extraordinary results on the short distance (see Halo: Reach), but fall short of breath over the long term. James Cameron’s Avatar has shattered total grossing records up to date of nearly $3 billion globally.