Phantom Blade Zero had an incredible opening weekend. It received very positive reviews, reaching a score of 88 on Metacritic, climbed to the top of the charts on Steam, and sold 4 million copies worldwide within 72 hours.
Beijing-based studio S-Game released Phantom Blade Zero, a wuxia RPG with soulslike elements, on Oct. 29. Although some players found the combat less challenging than they would’ve hoped, the fighting sequences are one-of-a-kind, with great animation for each kung fu move and beautiful cinematics. As Paulo Kawanishi put it in Polygon’s review of Phantom Blade Zero, it “perfectly captures the meaning of martial arts by chasing more the artistic aspect of the fighting styles and visual poetry of the fantastical battles staged in Wuxia movies.”
Estimates indicate the game sold at least one million copies pre-launch. The Chinese gaming market is huge, and all eyes were on Phantom Blade Zero this weekend, especially after its rave reviews, but no one anticipated just how many players would flock to it. It reached 833,000 concurrent players within hours of launch, making it the second-highest-played single-player game of the year after Palworld.
Phantom Blade Zero sells 4 million copies within 72 hours
S-Game has now confirmed that Phantom Blade Zero sold 4 million copies in its opening weekend. The sales figures aren’t enough to beat Black Myth Wukong, a game of similar nature, which sold 10 million copies in its opening weekend, but it is still an impressive feat nonetheless. Sales numbers are expected to continue rising throughout the week.
If sales keep rising, it won’t take long for Phantom Blade Zero to climb to the top of the best-selling games of 2026 charts. At the moment, the top three are NBA 2k27, Resident Evil: Requiem, and 007: First Light, according to data shared by Circana at the beginning of October. According to Capcom’s recent sales data, Resident Evil: Requiem sold 8.5 million copies since its release on Feb. 27, 2026. Phantom Blade Zero could climb past that number before the end of the year.
Phantom Blade Zero had a digital-only release, and it is a timed console exclusive for PlayStation 5. Therefore, it’s safe to assume that even more players will buy the game when it launches on Xbox or when the physical edition when it comes out in 2027.
In an interview with PCGamesN, Phantom Blade Zero‘s game director underlined that while it has some soulslike elements, the game’s objective isn’t to frustrate players with excessively high difficulty levels. This may have contributed to its success, as it makes Phantom Blade Zero more accessible to all types of gamers. The main goal is for players to have fun and enjoy a cinematic experience. Rather than simply avoiding death, executing perfect moves in combat will reward players with “fancy animations.”
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