No one would have expected the dodgeball brawler Knockout City to be a hit. But just days after hearing that EA plans to permanently expand the free trial, here we are, 5 million players later.

EA broke the milestone news in a new blog post, sharing that Knockout City hit the 5 million milestone two weeks after its release and just 10 days after hitting 2 million players. While specific numbers were not disclosed, they said that more than 500 million knockouts had been recorded and "millions of hours" of game streaming had been completed.

That's too lousy for a game that was about to follow the same path as Rocket Arena. However, between cross-play at launch and a 10-day free trial, EA seems determined to maximize Knockout City's chances of staying alive. After fears that player numbers would plummet after those 10 days, EA last week extended the game's free trial indefinitely. This will allow players to play up to rank 25 before being asked to pay.

With that in mind, it looks like "Knockout City" will be around for a while. This is also a good thing, considering Morgan's review of "Knockout City" described the 3vs3 dodge-brawler as one of the best games of the year.

"It's endlessly impressive how much careful thought has gone into turning a largely ignored playground pastime in video games into a rich, competitive pastime. Nothing could be finer.