Call of Duty: Black Ops Sets New Five-Day Sales Record, Trumping Modern Warfare 2

Having declared last week that Call of Duty: Black Ops was "the biggest entertainment launch ever" after raking in an estimated $360 million on launch day in North America and the UK alone, publisher Activision today announced Treyarch's Cold War-era shooter has broken another record--for "five-day worldwide sell-through in dollars"

Call of Duty: Black Ops sold-through over $650 million in five days after launching on November 9, Activision reveals, beating out theatrical box office and book takings as well as video game records. Its own Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 claimed the launch day and five-day records this time last year but has been bested by Cod Blops in both.

"The title's success illustrates the mass appeal of interactive entertainment as millions of consumers are choosing to play Call of Duty: Black Ops at unprecedented levels rather than engage in other forms of media," said Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick. "The number of people playing online and the number of hours they are playing demonstrates how online gaming has become a mainstream form of entertainment and certainly validates Activision Blizzard's leadership role in online entertainment."

That's not all of Cod Blops' new records, mind. It has also set two new Xbox Live records on launch day, being played by more than 2.6 million unique gamers and logging 5.9 million multiplayer hours.

On top of that, Sony Computer Entertainment of America CEO Jack Tretton declared Cod Blops "an incredible success on PlayStation 3... driving unprecedented traffic to the PlayStation Network.

Back in retail, Black Ops became the "best-selling video game launch of all time on Amazon.com" and racked up records at GameStop too.

"Call of Duty: Black Ops had the highest number of pre-orders of any video game to date," said GameStop CEO Paul Raines. "It went on to become our biggest video game launch ever, which bodes well for game sales as we enter the holidays."

Cod Blops was released for PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii and DS on November 9. The PC version in particular had a bit of a rocky launch, as our Xav examined.