Blizzard Entertainment announced that as of the first 24 hours of Diablo III’s release, more than 3.5 million copies had been sold, setting the new all-time record for fastest-selling PC game.
That number does not include the more than 1.2 million players who received Diablo III as part of signing up for the World of Warcraft Annual Pass promotion. Altogether, more than 4.7 million gamers around the world were poised to storm Sanctuary on day 1 of Diablo III’s release -- representing the biggest PC-game launch in history.
As of the first week of the game’s availability, that number had already grown to more than 6.3 million.* The above figures also do not include players in Korean Internet game rooms, where Diablo III has become the top-played game, achieving a record share of more than 39% as of May 22.†
But Diablo III’s launch was not as smooth as one would expect from such a high profile game. A lot of players weren’t able to play the single player campaign on launch day due to the game’s always-online DRM requirement; Hardcore fans of the game also didn’t like the game’s new cheerful atmosphere and its (over) simplification; Not to mention, the fact that hackers have already found a way to hack user accounts.