Posted by: Chuck at 9/24/2005 9:11 AM

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They are breaking open the champagne at NC Soft and Arena.NET as their fantasy MMORPG Guild Wars has sold over 1 Million copies in North America and Europe.  It's certainly nice to see another MMORPG not names World of Warcraft announcing a new membership plateu as it appears to be a sign that the market is growing and not contracting.

NCsoft and ArenaNet’s Guild Wars surpasses one million units sold in North America and Europe

Acclaimed online game hits milestone in less than five months; activations show no sign of slowing as holiday season approaches

 

 

AUSTIN, Texas, Sept. 22, 2005—NCsoft^® (KSE: 036570.KS), the world’s leading developer and publisher of online computer games announces yet another milestone for its top-selling competitive roleplaying game, Guild Wars^®, from ArenaNet^® studios. More than one million units have been purchased since the game launched on April 28^th of this year, and the numbers are increasing.

“We reached this lofty goal in an extremely short period of time,” said Robert Garriott, president of NCsoft’s North American business. “We launched the game in late April and throughout the notoriously slow summer buying season, account activations just continued to grow. Our business model, which does not require a subscription fee, coupled with the quality of the game, have struck a chord with gamers everywhere.”

“At EBGames, Guild Wars has been one of the most successful PC products during the summer and early fall,” said Carol Beck, vice president of merchandising at EBGames. “As we head to the critical holiday shopping season, we expect the game to continue to be a top seller and become one of the most requested games on holiday shopping lists.”

“We are extremely pleased the game has been so well received in such a short amount of time,” said ArenaNet co-founder Michael O’Brien. “Our commitment to our players is consistently to provide high-level support for the game through frequent gameplay and content updates and we believe that’s a big reason why we have so many people playing the game today.”

Earlier this month ArenaNet released their Sorrow’s Furnace Update, a free expansion of Guild Wars content that offers two new explorable regions, new quests, new monsters, new items and more. Players already are applauding the newly released update.

Guild Wars is a competitive online roleplaying game that rewards player skill more than time played. Players explore a rich fantasy game world, acquire skills, build personalized characters and compete in head-to-head guild battles with players from around the world.

NCsoft and ArenaNet soon will be launching Guild Wars in both Japan and Taiwan with fully-localized versions.

More information about Guild Wars can be found at http://www.guildwars.com.