The titular God of War returned on PlayStation 4 to kick-start a brand new trilogy of games in Norse mythology. Kratos looks better than ever and so does the franchise itself when accounting for sales the last installment generated.
Speaking with New York Times in a recent interview, chairman and chief executive Kenichiro Yoshida revealed that God of War as a franchise has now sold more than 51 million copies worldwide. While a breakdown was not shared, the impressive figure potentially puts the PS4 installment (also titled God of War) at either over or close to 20 million copies sold on PS4 alone.
God of War was released on PS4 in April 2018 and sold over 10 million copies by May 2019, by which the franchise crossed 40 million copies sold worldwide. That means an additional 11 million copies or more in the franchise were sold since then to make up for the aforementioned 51 million figure. Most of those 11 million copies have to predominantly be for the PS4 installment. That hence means God of War on PS4 is either closing in on 20 million copies sold or has already crossed over. Either way stands for a massive achievement for the franchise.
Yoshida pointed out in the interview that first-party exclusive games (and franchises) were mostly responsible for the success PlayStation 4 enjoyed in the last console generation. He hence attributed the success to not only God of War but also Ghost of Tsushima which has now sold more than 5 million copies. The notion being that Sony will continue to focus on first-party exclusives to drive sales on PS5.
Santa Monica Studio is currently working on God of War: Ragnarok for PS5 as a sequel to the PS4 original. The follow-up remains to be unveiled though with rumors pointing at a release in late 2021 at the earliest. That may possibly not happen since Sony Interactive Entertainment has already secured the second half of 2021 for Horizon Forbidden West. Releasing two gigantic sequels so close to each other is always questionable.
