Activision estimates that it sold 5.6 million copies of the latest CoD in North America and the U.K. on November 9, vaulting past the previous record of 4.7 million set by Modern Warfare 2.
"There has never been another entertainment franchise that has set opening day records for two consecutive years and we are on track to outperform last year's five-day global sales record of $550 million," said Activision CEO Bobby Kotick.
NOTE: Here's where things get spoilerific:
Not everyone is pleased that more than 5.6 million people have already played Black Ops. Cuba's state-run media is furious the game's opening mission tasks players with assassinating Fidel Castro in an operation set during the Bay of Pigs Invasion. In a slow-motion scene, a digitized version of the now 84-year-old former president of Cuba is shot in the face.
"What the United States government did not manage to do in 50 years, now it attempts to accomplish by virtual means," state-run website Cubadebate stated (as reported by the Associated Press). "On the one hand, it glorifies the illegal assassination attempts the United States government planned against the Cuban leader... and on the other, it stimulates sociopathic attitudes in North American children and adolescents."
Shortly after the assassination, players learn that the man they killed was Castro's body double. Castro also appears in Black Ops' Zombie mode alongside former U.S. Presidents John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon.
Cuba's fury isn't slowing Black Ops' momentum, and many analysts are now projecting the game will sell nearly 12 million copies by January 1 and potentially top Modern Warfare's lofty 20 million total.
Sharkey says: After the many online issues with Modern Warfare 2 and the Infinity Ward/Activision debacle, I didn't even think I'd buy Black Ops. I'm glad I did. It's easily Treyarch's best CoD game to date. There isn't much in the way of new gameplay features, but the studio did a great job of tightening things up. If, like me, you thought the franchise was rapidly on the decline, Black Ops confirms CoD still has a lot of life left in it. 
