EA boasts: SimCity sells over 1.1 million units

Given the incredibly volatile launch SimCity has experienced, you'd think that Electronic Arts would wait before issuing a press release about the game's sales figures. With EA woefully unprepared for the game's demand, perhaps it would have been best to wait until after players have redeemed their compensatory games before sounding the trumpets.

But, no. Here we go.

EA has announced that SimCity has sold through more than 1.1 million units in the first two weeks of sale, "making this the biggest SimCity launch of all time." According to EA, more than half of those copies were sold through Origin and other digital download services.

"SimCity had a great weekend with sales strong across both North America and Europe, adding to overwhelming demand at launch that has us tracking well beyond expectations for the game," EA COO Peter Moore said in the press release. According to Maxis' Lucy Bradshaw, EA expected half the demand at launch.

At the very least, EA's press release does acknowledge some of the game's launch issues, noting that server capacity has been increased by "more than 400%," and that server response time has been "optimized by 40 times."

With EA's free game promo lasting until next week, there's a good chance that SimCity sales may rocket even further. With recent games like Dead Space 3 included in the promo, some may jump at the opportunity to pay $60 for not one--but two--games.