If you've been paying attention surrounding the PC hit Demigod, you'll know the game's had a troublesome journey since its completion. First it was released a week early by GameStop. In turn, this brought the game to torrent websites earlier than usual, and finally, a heckuva lot more pirates than expected jumped onboard, all trying to connect online (why, we have no idea), all contributing to major problems server-side for the game's online play.
It was partly publisher Stardock's fault -- as they've said, they could've anticipated things like this to some extent and prepared better. In any case, rest assured, they've been working like crazy since launch to get everything resolved, and hopefully that will be soon (in the meantime, things aren't too bad).
Anyway, despite all this, the game has debuted at #3 at retail! This doesn't count its availability on the publisher's Impulse service, where we expect perhaps the sales were even higher (the game requires it for online play and updates anyway). We reckon it would've been at #2 or #1 by now if it weren't for these issues, too (Stardock's CEO Brad Wardell has stated they lost hundreds of pre-orders due to the fuss). Assuming all the issues are worked out shortly, we look forward to the sales for next month to see if the title made it even higher. Wardell is certainly happy -- "So much for piracy", he says.
Aside from that, the latest expansion in the Company of Heroes franchise, Tales of Valor, does well for Relic, debuting at #4 at retail and #1 on Direct2Drive. D2D has its usual wacky list, ranging from MLB 2K9 to Civ4 to DCS: Black Shark (a combat flight sim).
NPD's Top Ten (4/12 - 4/18)
World Of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King / Blizzard / $38 The Sims 2 Double Deluxe / EA Maxis / $20 Demigod / Gas Powered Games / $39 Company of Heroes: Tales of Valor / Relic / $29 Empire: Total War / Creative Assembly / $50 Left 4 Dead / Valve / $29 World Of Warcraft Battle Chest / Blizzard / $38 World Of Warcraft / Blizzard / $20 The Sims 2 Apartment Life Exp. Pack / EA Maxis / $19 Spore / EA Maxis / $50Direct2Drive's Top Ten (4/12 - 4/18)
Company of Heroes: Tales of Valor / Relic Final Fantasy XI Vana'diel Collection / Square Enix MLB 2K9 / Visual Concepts Rome: Total War Gold / Creative Assembly Civilization IV / Firaxis Games The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena / Starbreeze Fallout 3 / Bethesda DCS: Black Shark / The Fighter Collection Command & Conquer 3: Red Alert - Uprising / EA LA The Godfather 2 / EA Redwood Shores
