THQ Sees Most Preorders Ever With 200,000 Homefront Reservations

Publisher THQ revealed that its upcoming first-person shooter Homefront is the most preordered game in the company's history, attracting some 200,000 reservations in the U.S. alone. Developed by THQ's subsidiary Kaos Studios for Windows PC, Xbox 360, and PS3, Homefront will release across North America, Europe and Australia in two weeks. The first-person shooter has picked up some controversy over its depiction of a future Korea invading the U.S. -- South Korea has banned sales for the title. It's likely that preorder count was boosted significantly by a recent promotion from streaming games service OnLive, in which the company is giving away its Microconsoles for free (usually priced at $99) to a limited number of players that preorder Homefront before March 14. This record number of reservations is good news for Kaos, which has reportedly been anxious that its parent company will shut down its New York studio and relocate staff to THQ's Montreal office after Homefront is shipped. THQ has implied that Homefront's sales will decide Kaos' fate. "I tell them the more successful a game is, the better the economics are for the franchise, and that will help to influence what we do," explained THQ's Core Cames VP Danny Bilson in an interview with Eurogamer. "So we haven't made any decisions at the moment... We're going to look at how it goes. We don't want to relocate people just to relocate people." He added, A lot of it has to do with how successful it is and how strong that core team comes out on the other side. I love those guys. I've worked very closely with them on this game for years. There's nothing disrespectful going on at all. We're trying to do what's best for everyone."