Bethesda Softworks has revealed that Dishonored has surpassed their internal sales expectations and is now at the point where the publisher is planning to develop the IP into their next franchise.
Speaking to Destructiod, Bethesda’s head of PR Pete Hines stated:
“I can tell you that Dishonored is far exceeding our sales expectations, which is especially cool considering it’s new IP facing a host of well-established franchises this quarter. We did terrific numbers again this past weekend, both in stores and on Steam, where Dishonored was listed as the #1 selling title over the holiday weekend. And Dishonored has really sold well overseas.”
“So, we’re very pleased and appreciate all the fans that have supported Dishonored and Arkane. We clearly have a new franchise.”
While we don’t know exactly how well Dishonored is selling, it certainly sounds like it made as big of a splash at retail as it made with critics. Most importantly, it proved that it is possible to successfully launch a new IP towards the end of a console cycle. Hopefully that message gets through to other publishers and we can break the trend of seeing nothing but sequels for the last several years of any given console generation.