We loved Brotherhood, awarding Ubisoft's latest Assassin's Creed adventure a five star review, and the game was a hit with other critics, generating an aggregate Metacritic score of 90. Fans responded in kind, lifting Brotherhood to the biggest ever Assassin's Creed launch, according to numbers from GFK Chart-Track.
GFK, which tracks sales in the UK, does not provide sales totals, but by comparing Brotherhood to Assassin's Creed II, we get a good idea of how the title performed and the potential it has to become a blockbuster this holiday season.
According to VG Chartz, Assassin's Creed II launched last year with more than 1.7 million copies sold during its first week on the shelves worldwide, including nearly 700,000 copies in Europe. The game would go on to sell more than 8 million copies around the world.
However, Ubisoft's huge launch was not enough to top Activision's juggernaut, Call of Duty: Black Ops. According to GFK, Brotherhood fell short of topping Black Ops by roughly 63,000 copies.
Sharkey says: After reporting a $121 million loss during its fiscal first half, Ubisoft desperately needed Brotherhood to perform, and it looks like the game managed to top the publisher's expectations. We won't know how the game performed in the States until Ubisoft makes an announcement or the NPD Group reports November sales next month, but based on the early returns from the UK, it looks like Brotherhood will enjoy a worldwide opening right around 2 million copies.
