IO Interactive has revealed that Hitman: World of Assassination has reached an impressive milestone of over 75 million players. This achievement suggests that it may be the most successful game ever produced by the Danish studio.
This title deserves a special note because World of Assassination is technically not just a single game, but rather a collection of games. Two years after the third installment of the new trilogy was released, IO Interactive decided to bundle the latest three Hitman games into one package, while still offering the option to buy them separately. The complete trilogy was reintroduced for PC and consoles in January 2023, and it also became available on the Meta Quest 3 in September 2024.
On January 10, IO Interactive took to Twitter to share the exciting news that Hitman: World of Assassination has reached an impressive milestone of 75 million players over its lifetime. The studio celebrated this as a “monumental” success, noting that their business is currently “more solid than ever.” While they didn’t delve into further specifics about this achievement, it’s likely that Hitman 3 played a significant role in boosting the overall player count. Previous sales data suggests that Hitman 3 has outperformed its predecessor in key markets, such as the UK, and that the earlier game managed to recover its development costs more quickly than the 2016 version.
Hitman’s Latest Player Milestone Is Likely Driven by Xbox Game Pass and Free Starter Pack
Ultimately, it seems that the 75-million-player achievement was less about the individual games and more about Hitman: World of Assassination being on Xbox Game Pass for two years, ending in January 2024. Another key element is the Free Starter Pack that IO Interactive has made available since the game debuted in 2021. Plus, the first two games in the trilogy had free demos that helped attract even more players.
Despite Massive Success, the Hitman Series Is Currently on a Kind Of Hiatus
Hitman: World of Assassination continues to enjoy regular content updates, and IO Interactive has assured fans that this will be the case for the foreseeable future. However, it appears that the developer’s current emphasis on the franchise is primarily on smaller content releases, such as Elusive Targets.
Instead of developing another Hitman title, IO Interactive is currently focused on two distinct projects. One of these is a game inspired by the James Bond franchise, known as Project 007, which has been in development since 2020. The other project, announced in 2023, is called Project Fantasy, a new intellectual property that seeks to take IOI into a more imaginative realm.