Battlefield 3 Pre-Orders Close To 3M As Game Launches In North America

EA has revealed that Battlefield 3, which launched today in North America, has seen nearly three million pre-orders in total. This figure, based on internal EA estimates as of October 24, means that the multiplayer shooter saw nearly one million pre-orders in the last week, since Kevin O'Leary, project manager at Electronic Arts, revealed that the game had attracted 2 million pre-orders. The game previously had 1 million pre-orders over the course of a month and a half, with over 1 million total pre-orders registered in September. An open beta for the game ran during the first couple of weeks of this month, with a total of 9.5 million gamers taking part. The game is due to be released in regions worldwide this week. Earlier this week, Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter predicted that Activision's competing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 will sell around 16 million units this year, while Battlefield 3 will sell 8 million.