The WoW extension Shadowlands could already set a small record before the release. According to Activision Blizzard, no other add-on in the history of WoW has done so well in advance sales. However, the publisher has not announced concrete figures.
After a short-term postponement last month, the MMO expansion World of Warcraft: Shadowlands is scheduled for release in Europe on November 24, 2020. But even before the release, the latest add-on managed to set a small record. This was revealed by Bobby Kotick, CEO of the publisher Activision Blizzard, at an investor conference. According to his statements, the advance sale is going very well so far:
“We have seen unprecedented trends since the number of subscribers doubled last year after the launch of World of Warcraft Classic. Pre-sales for the upcoming Shadowlands expansion have reached the highest level of any previous release to date at this time prior to the release.
Kotick did not provide concrete figures. However, this statement clearly shows that the interest in the now 16-year-old online roleplaying game still seems to be very high. Almost casually, the CEO also mentioned that World of Warcraft is one of the few Activision Blizzard brands that generate over a billion dollars in sales per year. This category otherwise only includes the Call of Duty shooter series.
Currently, players are fighting their way through the pre-patch 9.0.1 for World of Warcraft. Among the features are a new level mechanism and a new starting area for newly created characters. Furthermore, thanks to Level-Squish, the maximum level is no longer 120 but 50.