Skyrim just hit stores last week, and Bethesda couldn't be happier with the reception - both critically and commercially. The game right now is sitting at a lofty 96 on Metacritic and has 50 perfect scores, and today Bethesda announced that 3.5 million copies were sold in just two days after launch (out of 7 million shipped).
Skyrim is expected to produce a haul of $450 million for Bethesda from the title's launch, and who knows how far it'll go beyond that. Bethesda has said it's already gotten plenty of reorders from retailers and Skyrim is doing quite well on the digital front as well, as the game apparently set a record on Steam with more than 280,000 concurrent players.
"We are grateful for the fans' response to Skyrim," said ZeniMax Media CEO Robert Altman (ZeniMax is the corporate parent of Bethesda). "Todd Howard and his team at Bethesda Game Studios have crafted a very special game. Anticipation for Skyrim has surpassed any game in our company's history, and we are pleased that sales and reviews have reflected the quality and hours of amazing gameplay it provides."
For comparison purposes, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 sold 6.5 million units in a single day, Oblivion shipped 1.7 million copies, Fallout 3 shipped 4.7 million, and Fallout: New Vegas shipped 5 million units. Not bad for a series without a tacked-on multiplayer mode.
