Following the reported revelation earlier this year that pre-order sales for Treyarch and Activision Blizzard’s Call of Duty: Black Ops had already surpassed those of 2009’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 during a similar timeframe, videogame retail monolith GameStop has announced that at this point in 2010, this is definitely the case.

According to a press release, GameStop is seeing “record reservations” for Black Ops:

“GameStop is tracking to all-time, record reservations on Call of Duty: Black Ops. We are ahead of where we were with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 last year, which previously set the industry standard.”

If pre-orders for Black Ops at the largest dedicated game store in the world are “ahead” of Modern Warfare 2 at this point in the year – a game that went on to sell 4.7 million units on day one and generate $310 million in 24 hours – what kind of sales numbers can we expect from this new title?

In a recent ‘Question of the Week,’ we put it to you that there was a chance that hardcore gamers – the tastemakers, those in the know – might not pick up Black Ops in the wake of Activision’s handling of the Infinity Ward debacle, Activision’s general management of its range of franchises (Tony Hawk, Guitar Hero et al), as well as and CEO Bobby Kotick’s common and seemingly offhanded remarks about his company and the industry in which he works.

But even the influence of the mighty hardcore gamer seems to not be very effective, given GameStop’s statements. Or perhaps the hardcore gamers – those of you who scour message boards and websites such as El33tonline and others for the latest information – are truly enamoured with the next iteration of the Call of Duty franchise, and are further encouraging more casual-hardcore Call of Duty fans to pick up the title?

It’s not surprising – Black Ops is certainly looking impressive and I’m personally looking forward to the improvements to multiplayer, and will at least be able to appreciate what is sure to be a blockbuster singleplayer campaign.

But will Black Ops outpace Modern Warfare 2 at retail come release day, on November 9th? All signs are pointing towards the path labelled ‘Yes.’

El33tonline has amassed a great deal of coverage on Call of Duty: Black Ops, and it would be remiss of me not to recommend that you browse through the bounty to see many batches of screenshots, bunches of videos, and extra information, including our impressions of the game and a gamescom 2010 interview with Treyarch community manager Josh Olin.

Source: Escapist