Black Ops 4's lack of campaign didn't hurt sales 'in the slightest'

Treyarch and Activision took a risk by omitting a traditional single-player campaign from Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, although Andy K. predicted a few months before its release that most fans of the series wouldn't care. It looks like he was spot on: Launch-day sales on the PC set "a new franchise high" and more than doubled those of last year's Call of Duty: WWII, and as reported by VentureBeat, the NPD Group has declared it the best-selling game of the month, the year, and one of its best-sellers of all time.

"Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 launch month dollar sales represent the eighth highest in videogame history since The NPD Group began tracking in 1995," the NPD said. "Black Ops 4 instantly becomes the best-selling game of the year, and the second best-selling game across the past twelve month period, trailing only Call of Duty: WWII."

NPD analyst Mat Piscatella summed it up unequivocally on Twitter:

So, quick hit takes from the October 2018 U.S. Video Game data from The NPD Group:- The lack of a SP campaign did not hurt Black Ops IIII launch month sales in the slightest- On the full game Video Game side, year to date, both Physical and Digital game sales are up YoY (cont.)November 20, 2018

Black Ops 4 came in ahead of Red Dead Redemption 2 in October, and while RDR2 isn't available on PC, the sales figures used in the NPD ranking does not include PC digital sales because Activision does not provide numbers from Battle.net, which kind of balances the scales. In its third quarter financial results announced earlier this month, however, Activision said that "PC sell-through" of Black Ops 4 was more than three times higher than Black Ops 3 over the first three weeks of release, and that active users and hours played were up significantly as well.

Thanks, Gamasutra.

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.