To me the number is staggering: US $775 million sales for Modern Warfare 3 (MW3) in just 5 days. Techcrunch.com reported this on Thursday http://tcrn.ch/uGzouB. I don’t play the game but I have heard complaints from players of Modern Warfare 2 that the new game does not offer much more than an opportunity to plunk down another $60. Others feel that Activision/Blizzard the creator of the MW franchise has apparently done a good job of addressing the issues associated with MW2. Either way the success is palpitating.

Could you imagine a film release that generated even 25% of $775 million in 5 days? Granted movie tickets are less expensive than $60 (although creeping up constantly), but film producers can only dream of having the kind of connection to a franchise that Modern Warfare has managed to create.

For some reason I began to imagine what could be done with three-quarters of a billion discretionary dollars. With budget cuts for essential services being felt all around the U.S., it’s difficult (for me) to not think about what could be accomplished had people not purchased the new game and collectively combined those financial resources to address what might be considered a more pressing need. There are too many to mention all, but hunger, education, and healthcare come to mind quickly.

OK I know I am dreaming, and am not impugning or indicting those that purchased MW3. A baseball game ticket costs the same amount and is no less frivolous and may be more so. But in a time where people are struggling to make ends meet it seems a bit incongruent that more than three-quarters of a billion dollars could be spent on pure entertainment – I wonder if any of the MW3 buyers are the same people that are part of the OWS – Occupy Wall Street movement?

Video game entertainment is important as a release from everyday life and it creates jobs – a good many of them for an industry valued globally at US $65 billion (as of June 2011 from Wikipedia).

If you are a gamer how much do you spend annually on buying games?