Skyrim sells 3.5 million in two days, Bethesda expecting huge revenues

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“Skyrim has surpassed any game in our company’s history,” says studio

The champagne is flowing at Bethesda following the (predictably) successful launch of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. According to its enthusiastic press release today, the open world fantasy epic has shipped over seven million copies, and is expected to garner over $450 million in retail sales.

“We are grateful for the fans’ response to Skyrim,” said Robert Altman, Chairman and CEO of ZeniMax Media, Bethesda's parent company. “Todd Howard and his team at Bethesda Game Studios have crafted a very special game. Anticipation for Skyrim has surpassed any game in our company’s history, and we are pleased that sales and reviews have reflected the quality and hours of amazing gameplay it provides.”

Skyrim's launch has been one of the most successful yet for Zenimax. The press release reports over half of the launch copies sold within the first two days, and its release on Valve's online digital distribution service Steam set a new record with over 280,000 concurrent players. Bethesda also touted its sterling record of achieving over 50 perfect review scores for Skyrim, among which include GR's 10/10 judgement.

“Without a doubt, this has been our most ambitious project ever,” said Todd Howard, Skyrim Game Director. “After over three years of development, we’re finally excited to get it into everyone’s hands.”

Let us know if you think Skyrim is worthy of its recent successes (you know, arrow-in-head-glitch notwithstanding).

Matt Bradford

Matt Bradford wrote news and features here at GamesRadar+ until 2016. Since then he's gone on to work with the Guinness World Records, acting as writer and researcher for the annual Gamer's Edition series of books, and has worked as an editor, technical writer, and voice actor. Matt is now a freelance journalist and editor, generating copy across a multitude of industries.