I wonder how accurate 3 year old VGchartz data is. A quick search for "halo 2 sales" on google show that Microsoft claimed 2.38 million sales for its first day. VGchartz has 2.47 over 4 days.
Keep in mind the September NPD period ends October 6, so this future is for the first two weeks of sales. Halo 2 sold 3,200K in its first two weeks of sales.
I think that Halo 3 will follow a similar pattern to over-hyped movie sequels. I think we can expect the vast majority of sales to be in the first month and then see a sharp dropoff. Unless 360 sales improve (and stay high for the next 6 months), I don't see this title passing Halo 2 in sales.
i think that sounds like a much more realistic estimate, perhaps even still slightly high simply due to the install base difference at the time of the original Xbox. ... does anyone have any install base estimates on Xbox when halo 2 came out?
If you check the VGC, while not the greatest of sources, you can check the first week and month of Halo 2's launch. The game was released when the console was at a far cheaper price and sold somewhere in the ballpark of 2.2 to 2.6 million units in its first week.
Now we have the next installment of this game on a console with a smaller install base and a higher entry barrier with a $350 price. ($410 with game). I think that it will sell slightly less in the first week. Somewhere around 1.9 to 2.2 million units in its first week, IMO.
I just read that 'report' about the 4 million pre-orders...I'd be taking that with a HUGE grain of salt...4 million from ONE retail chain and it doesn't include Walmarts/BestBuy/Targets etc etc?
That story is from May 2007 ... later on we have a story from AUG 2007 stating 1 million in US preorders...from a much better source I may add too.
3
I thought we all 'knew' that game companies actually have NO clue how much they sell on day one...its all anecdotal isn't it?