Watch Dogs had the best launch of any new IP ever in the UK last week, even going as far as to beat Assassin’s Creed III, Ubisoft’s previous best launch. When compared to the biggest launch sellers ever, Watch Dogs is the 17th biggest launch in the UK’s history, but only games from existing IPs such as Call of Duty and FIFA sold more. A majority of these sales were for PS4, which saw an increase of 94% on hardware sales with the release of the title.
In second place was Mario Kart 8, which is largely credited for an incredible 666% increase in Wii U sales. Of those sales, 84% were the Wii U bundle with Mario Kart 8. Clearly this is the kind of response Nintendo has been waiting for when revisiting old IPs and it certainly looks promising for the launch of the new Super Smash Bros. Nintendo is surely hoping that this success also translates to more sales in other markets, so that the Wii U will finally gain the traction they have been waiting for. It certainly changes their narrative going into E3, which starts next week.
Maybe they should have Reggie sacrifice a goat.
