2 million volunteer for The Old Republic beta

The recent beta test for EA's forthcoming Star Wars MMO The Old Republic attracted two million volunteers, the publisher has announced.

CFO Eric Brown announced the figure at the annual Global Media and Communications Conference in New York earlier today, adding that 725,000 unique users logged on to the game over the Thanksgiving weekend, with each one logging an average of 12 hours each over a three day period.

Brown claimed that at the beta's peak there was "just over a quarter of a million" users playing at the same time.

Earlier this year, EA CEO John Riccitiello claimed that the game, which launches on 20th December, only needs 500,000 paying subscribers to turn a profit.