Today, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment released new sales data on Hogwarts Legacy via an interview with Variety. The game has sold over 22 million copies in 2023, adding two million units just in the month of December, according to the publisher. Moreover, according to Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment president David Haddad, it is the best-selling game released last year.
But it’s not just the unit sold that I’m so proud of, it’s just that it delighted the fans so much. It brought Harry Potter to life in a new way for gamers where they could be themselves in this world, in this story. And that’s what the team at Avalanche set out to do when they were developing the game and I think that’s really why it resonated so well and remains the best-selling game of the year in the entire industry worldwide. That’s a position that typically is held by one of these incumbent’s sequel games and we’re so proud that we’ve been able to break into the top ranks.
This won’t surprise those following the extraordinary success of Hogwarts Legacy, which topped sales in both the United States and the United Kingdom, beating the usual juggernauts and chart leaders Call of Duty and FIFA (now called EA Sports FC). However, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom could still be a contender for that title since it had reached 19.5 million units sold as of September 30. We’ll have to wait until Nintendo’s next quarterly report before we can declare a winner.
Regardless, Haddad has great cause to be happy. People spent more than 707 million hours playing Hogwarts Legacy, brewing 819 million potions, harvesting 1.3 billion magical plants, rescuing 593 million magical beasts, and defeating 4.9 billion dark wizards. It is no wonder, then, that Warner Bros. is already preparing ‘a series of other things that will let the fans be part of this world and stories and characters in deeper and deeper ways’. More games in the Harry Potter are definitely on the way. The Warner Bros. executive also referenced Quidditch Champions, stating that the developers are working on tuning the game so it can be delightful to fans.
Haddad then outlined the gaming plan of Warner Bros. Discovery:
There’s a unique and important role games have in keeping our franchises relevant, resonant and exciting because there’s plenty of fans and plenty of people consuming content where games are their starting point, it’s their preferred form of content. When you ask what our goals are, it’s really that macro goal of making sure that we get as much engagement with the fans as possible using content and releases and updates and live services.
Could Hogwarts Legacy also get DLCs? Haddad didn’t talk about that, but the possibility remains with that statement.
