Red Dead Redemption is shaping up to be the biggest UK video game launch of 2010 so far - and by some distance.

That's according to leading UK entertainment retailer HMV - who told CVG that since going on sale yesterday, the title's launch sales are outdoing those of Heavy Rain, Final Fantasy XIII and other huge 2010 releases.

The firm said it expected Rockstar to sell an astonishing 300,000 copies of Red Dead in its opening two days on the UK market.

"Red Dead Redemption is comfortably shaping up to be the biggest and fastest-selling title of 2010 so far - ahead of the likes of Final Fantasy, Battlefield and even Heavy Rain, which we had as a major exclusive," HMV games commercial manager Jonathan Hayes told CVG.

"I wouldn't be surprised if the title does the best part of 300,000 unit sales on its opening Friday and Saturday.

"We've done really well with the release online at HMV.com with pre-orders, prompted in part by our free 'The War Horse' exclusive download offer. Customers have also responded strongly in-store - drawn equally to our offer of 800 free XBox Live points on the XBox and a free copy of '3:10 to Yuma' starring Russell Crowe and Christian Bale on PS3 purchases. It's been a welcome shot in the arm to the market."

To put that into some context, it took Heavy Rain a couple of months to sell a million worldwide.

HMV is selling both the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of the game for under £40 online and in-store.

CVG revealed yesterday that the PS3 version of the game is in short supply at UK retail.

Check out our Red Dead Redemption review here to see just how good the game really is.

website: http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=247752

Well it deserves it, great job Rockstar.

Maybe in the UK. But I doubt WW.

Definitely well-deserved. We've had a lot of pretty big releases this year, but Red Dead Redemption seems like it has the ability to be quite colossal as well. Based on VGC first day sales in America and this thing, we could be looking at maybe a 1.5 million opening week for the title which would be fantastic.

I'm definitely enjoying this title with already a solid 15-20 hours spent on it in the 4 days I've had it. Rockstar really out did themselves with this game.

Could of been double that if they let supermarkets sell it cheap.

UK is strange.

it deserves to do well, so dus ff13 (more so).

bt this is a bit misleding becaus FF isnt tht big in UK, the top sellng ff tracked hs sold (Life to date) below 300K in UK (FF8, FF10), ff7 probbly did over 300K. bt ff13 hs been successful ther it did 230K in its first month so it is probbly more succsful thn ff10 & ff8 in uk. 
gud for evry1 & it makes me proud to see hevy rain listed.

Great but Gran Turismo 5, Halo Reach and Super Mario Galaxy 2 will beat it. Even God of War 3 will beat RDR for PS3 and Gears 3 will beat RDR X360 ver.