Black Myth: Wukong is already one of the fastest-selling games of all time, moving almost as many units in one week as Elden Ring and Cyberpunk did in their first months
Black Myth: Wukong's first week of sales numbers are in, and they firmly inhabit "Don't take a big sip of coffee before you look at them" territory. 10 million units sold, which, as industry analyst Daniel Ahmad pointed out on X, "The Everything App," is a record-breaking performance that leaves some of the biggest releases of the past few years in the dust.
For perspective, here are some comparative numbers:
Hogwarts Legacy: 15 million in three months
Elden Ring: 13 million in one month
Cyberpunk 2077: 13.7 million in one month
Baldur's Gate 3: 20+ million in five months
Helldivers 2: 12 million in three months
The only game that comes close is Palworld's 19 million players in two weeks, a mark that Black Myth: Wukong seems on track to surpass. It's a sales figure that lines up with Wukong having leapfrogged the competition to be the #2 most-played game in Steam's history by concurrent players. Before that, it was also the most wishlisted game on the platform after The Day Before met its ignominious end.
The devs are your typical misogynist bro types (“we don’t need female gamers!”) that unfortunately reflects the broader cultural brainrot on the Chinese internet, especially the g*mer type.
But the game itself is gorgeous and incredibly well made for a first time developer. Not to mention that literally every Chinese person is well familiar with the stories from the Journey to the West - a cultural foothold that has persisted for nearly a thousand years! You learn about the stories from local folklores, reading materials in schools, visual narration from TV shows, memes and jokes on the internet. It’s pervasive and so so deeply ingrained in the Chinese cultural sphere, that the game was already half successful simply from the source material alone lol!
The original JTTW sure was. There was one chapter where 2 of the 4 male main characters drink water from a magic river, get pregnant, and they have to do a whole ass quest to get those two a magic abortion. It's beautiful.