S-Game says Phantom Blade Zero sold four million copies in 72 hours

Developer S-Game announced through Phantom Blade Zero’s official X account on November 2, 2026 that the wuxia action game sold four million copies within 72 hours of its October 29, 2026 release on PlayStation 5 and PC.

PCGamesN said concurrent players passed the half-million mark within the first few hours after launch and that the game ranked second behind Counter-Strike 2. Beebom said the count reached 700,000 within 24 hours and climbed past 830,000 by the weekend, while S-Game’s announcement tracked on Steam charts recorded a Sunday peak of 833,921. Ghacks Technology News cited a recorded Steam peak of 227,434 for Modern Warfare 4 and said the difference was more than 600,000 players.

Ghacks Technology News said Phantom Blade Zero was first in Steam sales charts. It was also first in revenue charts, ahead of PUBG, Dota 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, Aion 2 and Probably Stolen. Khel Now said the game launched on October 29, 2026. PCGamesN said it ranked number one in sales in many other territories, including the United States and United Kingdom.

Ghacks Technology News reported pre-launch estimates published the previous week put sales above one million copies before launch across Steam, PlayStation 5 and WeGame, with nearly two thirds from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. S-Game has not released a regional breakdown of the four million sales figure or split it by platform, and the studio has not shared a sales target beyond the milestone. The studio said, “Thank you everyone from the bottom of our hearts for all the love and support!”

The launch trails Black Myth: Wukong, which sold 10 million copies in its first three days in August 2024. Khel Now described S-Game as an independent studio making its first big AAA game and said the achievement shows the impact Black Myth Wukong had on Chinese developers, and it listed Crimson Desert at two million copies in one day, Onimusha at one million on launch day, The Blood of Dawnwalker at one million copies in two days, Pragmata at one million in three days, Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag Resynced at two million in one day, and Resident Evil Requiem at five million copies in five days.

PCGamesN said the game costs $59.99 or £49.99 and is available on Steam for PC, on PlayStation 5 via the PlayStation Store, and on Tencent’s WeGame storefront in China. User reviews are 89 percent positive and the Metacritic score is 89.

Game Director Soulframe Liang said the project began as a student RPG Maker creation called Rainblood: Town of Death, and S-Game canceled other projects after its PlayStation Showcase debut three years ago. After the reveal proved popular, the studio devoted all resources to the game. Liang said their first glimpse of Phantom Blade Zero blew away senior PlayStation executives, and he said the team shared a certain madness and obsession beyond skill and experience.

“Phantom Blade Zero exists to make you feel powerful and incredibly cool,” Liang said, and he said the goal was to create a wuxia action game everyone can enjoy while giving challenge seekers an extra rush of adrenaline. The game takes a softer approach than Dark Souls and Elden Ring by giving bigger bosses multiple stages with checkpoints, so players do not have to restart from the beginning. A few young teammates in their twenties created several of the game’s key battles. Art Director Michael Chang single-handedly drew the concept art for every character and most of the environments, and Music Director Caisheng Bo created more than 10 hours of music almost entirely by himself.

The title is an action RPG centered on traditional Chinese Wuxia storytelling with fast combat, fantasy, swordplay and steampunk-inspired elements. Combat options include 30-plus weapons and 20-plus Phantom Edges that players can combine for different combat styles. The cast includes Roger Craig Smith as Soul, Maggie Robertson as Mu Xiaokui, and Donnie Yen as Mó Yuan, with Yen also serving as key creative consultant using full facial, voice and motion capture. PCGamesN said Rainblood: Town of Death established the fundamentals for the wuxia world, which also includes body modification and parallel worlds.

The first patch, sized at 3.7 GB, launched on Steam on November 4, 2026, mirroring notes previously shared for the Chinese WeGame version. Wccftech reported the November 3 patch added features and fixes based on current player feedback as reported on the game’s subreddit. It introduced Hit SFX Intensity and Hit Impact SFX Intensity audio settings, added Interact button remapping on keyboard and controller, and delivered performance gains through optimized shader compilation. It reduced Hua grab attacks on Wayfarer and Pathbreaker while leaving Hellwalker and 66-Days untouched, a decision Wccftech noted leaves the soulslike experience to mods.

The first patch changed shader compilation so ray tracing shaders compile separately after a restart with ray tracing enabled instead of by default, reducing game startup times. S-Game added audio settings to adjust clashing blade tones, flexible PC control remapping, and support for 16:89 monitors, 16:10 laptops and handhelds, and ultrawide displays beyond 3:1 based on preview feedback. An Ultra+ mod offers ray-traced ambient occlusion and optional 4K textures. The mod reduces path-tracing noise and boiling, keeps the world dynamic in ray tracing and shadows, stops overwriting graphics CVars (console variables that control graphics settings), and offers sharper 4K rock, cliff and nature textures via its HDNatureTextures add-on.

Game Director Soulframe Liang said the Nvidia 621.01 driver can cause performance instability in Phantom Blade Zero and recommended rolling back to version 617.42 until the next driver update arrives. The day-one patch improves ray tracing and path tracing performance, and S-Game extensively tested the game on mid-range and lower-end PCs as well as handhelds.