Marvel's Wolverine has sold an estimated 1.9 million copies and taken around $130 million since it went on sale on September 15, according to Rhys Elliott, head of market analysis at Alinea Analytics. Both Eurogamer and IGN report the estimate, which Elliott published on social media.
Sony has not announced an official sales figure for the game. IGN notes that the publisher has done so for other PlayStation Studios releases: Sucker Punch’s Ghost of Yotei sold 3.3 million units in its first 32 days, and Insomniac’s own Spider-Man 2 was announced at more than 2.5 million copies in 24 hours.
Eurogamer reports that the 1.9 million figure covers the game’s first three days and includes roughly a million copies from pre-launch digital pre-orders.
Physical sales at 22.9 percent
Elliott put physical editions at 22.9 percent of the total, a share the two outlets describe differently — Eurogamer as a proportion of sales, IGN as a proportion of revenue. Both note that Sony plans to stop producing discs for new PlayStation games in 2028.
Eurogamer reports that the split leans more digital than several other recent PS5 releases, citing earlier Alinea Analytics figures of 35 percent physical revenue for Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, around 46 percent for Astro Bot and 37.6 percent for Ghost of Yotei. It also notes the game has been on shelves for a short time, and that the holiday season may change the split.
On Elliott’s numbers, Marvel’s Wolverine is the best-performing new PlayStation Studios game released on PS5 so far this year, ahead of MLB The Show, Bungie’s Marathon, Housemarque’s Saros and the fighting game Marvel Tōkon. IGN reports it is tracking behind Spider-Man 2, and has passed the lifetime PS5 copies and revenue of Death Stranding 2.
Eurogamer adds that 82 percent of buyers had previously played Marvel’s Spider-Man and 70 percent Spider-Man 2, while 43 percent have played Marvel Rivals.
So yes, Wolverine has sold well, but its commercial long tail is limited by its mixed media and streamer reception. Unlike Spider-Man, which reviewed insanely well and has stayed evergreen for years, this one’s tail will be shorter and lumpier, but still there.
The game holds a 77 Metascore. IGN scored it 6 out of 10, and Eurogamer’s review called it “just fine”.
