Activision has announced that $1bn worth of Call of Duty: Ghosts stock was sold to retailers for the first day of the game's launch. The figure was announced by the publisher's CEO Bobby Kotick who claimed, "Call of Duty is by far the largest console franchise of this generation".

However, the decision to reveal trade figures rather than actual game sales to consumers, has been met with interest by industry news sites. Activision usually waits until the first day or three-day sell through figures are counted before making announcements. Some have seen this as an attempt to compete with Grand Theft Auto V, which has sold almost 30m units since its launch in September and reached the $1bn revenue mark after three days on general release. The last Call of Duty title, Black Ops 2, took 15 days to reach the $1bn landmark.

"In the last 12 months, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, including its digital content, generated more revenues than any other console game ever has in a single year," said Kotick. "Although it is too early to assess sell-through for Call of Duty: Ghosts, it's launching at a time when the franchise has never been more popular."

However, review scores on Ghosts have been mixed, and the game's Metacritic average is 74 on Xbox 360 and 76 on PS3 – previous titles have been in the 80s and 90s. The series has been running since 2003, and sales hit a peak with 2010 instalment, Call of Duty: Black Ops, which sold 25m units, 5.6m of those on the first day of sale. According to CNN:

<blockquote>Michael Pachter, video game analyst at Wedbush Securities, forecasts Activision (ATVI) will sell 20m copies of Call of Duty: Ghosts this year. While that would crest the $1bn mark yet again, those numbers are 10% below Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 sales and 20% below peak sales of Call of Duty: Black Ops.</blockquote>

Ghosts was, however, the most pre-ordered title of the year according to US retailer GameStop. Kotick revealed during an investor call on Wednesday that Activision has new Call of Duty and Skylanders titles in development for next year. It has been rumoured that San Francisco-based developer Sledgehammer Games is currently working on a new title in the spin-off Call of Duty: Modern Warfare series, and this could well be the 2014 entry in the annual franchise.