Ubisoft has excitedly shared the news that the hotly anticipated Assassin's Creed 3 has become the most pre-ordered game in the company's history by a wide margin, reportedly more than doubling the previous record holder, 2011's Assassin's Creed: Revelations.

“Assassin’s Creed III is one of the most anticipated games of the year, and this impressive pre-order mark is just a hint of the game’s potential,” said Geoffroy Sardin, chief EMEA sales and marketing officer at Ubisoft. “When players discover the new features, historical period, characters and gaming experience that the development team has worked so hard to create, we’re confident that they will agree that this is the biggest, best Assassin’s Creed game yet.”

Customers still have time to place their pre-orders and benefit from exciting deals, including the Special Edition, an exclusive package with bonus in-game digital content; Single Player Mission: A Dangerous Secret, with an exclusive Flintlock Musket weapon reward. Available at all leading games retailers.

In related news that Ubi would surely be less happy about, the Xbox 360 version of the game has found its way into the hands of copyright infringers, with a version of the game playable on modified consoles now out in the wild, five days before the game's official launch.

Gameplay footage and spoilers are already starting to propagate, so exercise caution for a few days if you want to go into the American Revolution nice and fresh.

Although console piracy is somewhat less accessible and prevalent than PC piracy, this particular development is a touch ironic for the publisher, as the PC version's one month delay was presumed to be due to Ubisoft's piracy projections on the desktop platform. In an October GamesCom 2012 interview with GI International, Ubi CEO Yves Guillemot had claimed the PC as having "around a 93-95 per cent piracy rate".

Assassin’s Creed III officially launches on October 31 for PS3 and Xbox 360, on November 22 for PC, and during the "launch window" for the Wii U.