Halo 3 sells millions (and it’s not out yet)
Cory Bergman May 10th, 2007
The most popular console video game, Halo, is gearing up for a third round. Halo 3 is due out this fall for Xbox 360, but it reportedly already sold 4 million in pre-orders — according to some very unofficial stats. You may remember Halo 2 set a record for the most sales in a 24-hour period by any form of media, and industry watchers believe Halo 3 could smash that record. Some people who are pre-ordering the game don’t even own a 360 yet. So why all the hype? Check out this video released by Bungie featuring one of its beta testers putting Halo 3’s multiplayer to the test. Killer.
If there were a way to measure it, I would bet that Halo 3 will take a significant bite out of television viewing for 18-34 year olds in the weeks after its debut.
S Mark adds in comments: “Come on, you are smarter than this article. How many Xbox 360s have been sold? If this was true, that would mean almost half of all owners have registered with Gamestop for a pre-order? Gamestop doesn’t account for 1/2 let alone 1/4 of any games total sales, but in this case they do? But hey the clerk said it must be true, so it must right??”
Cory adds: Good point, and I added “very unofficial stats” to the post above. Yet quite possible overall. Halo 2 pre-sold 1.5 million, and a lot has changed since November 2004: A lot more consoles are out there, game sales across the board are way up and many more people are pre-ordering their games these days. Regardless of specific numbers, this game will set new records.
8 Comments Add your own
1. S Mark | May 11th, 2007 at 2:05 am
Come on, you are smarter than this article. How many XBOX 360s have been sold? If this was true, that would mean almost half of all owners have registered with gamestop for a pre-order? Gamestop doesn’t account for 1/2 let alone 1/4 of any games total sales, but in this case they do?
But hey the clerk said it must be true, so it must right??
2. !nvitedmedia | May 11th, 2007 at 5:18 am
currently a major problem with alot of tv people… they think they are “smarter” than alot of other folks.
3. Joe | May 11th, 2007 at 6:25 am
Hilarious “article”.
Kicks off with an unrelated Spider-Man 3 comment…
…flies right into the spurious verification “at five different Greater Cincinnati Gamestop locations”…
..then the confus-o-typo: “however company a document showing this information was not revealed”…
…then the backhanded compliment: “Many of Gamestop’s employees believe that a large portion of the preorders are being made by consumers that don’t even own a Xbox 360, that are ***just waiting for the price of the system to go down***” (emphasis mine)…
It is very well possible that Halo 3 pre-orders are this huge - after all, it’s the only reason most people even considered either Xbox system - but the fanboy press doesn’t do it any favors.
The real question is, why all the Xbox/Halo coverage on LR? I demand equal time for DS/Pokemon.
4. Joe | May 11th, 2007 at 8:22 am
…submitting again to escape the moderation wait…
And by the way, you might want to qualify the “most popular console video game of all time” statement.
Super Mario Bros alone has over 40 million units sold (that’s not including all the other Mario games). That’s worldwide. Any of the three core GTA games has more units sold than Halo 1 or 2.
And if you’re going to lump Halo 1 and 2 together as a franchise, there are dozens of franchises that have sold more, including Spyro the Freakin’ Dragon.
All available here on wikipedia under “best selling video game”
If there’s another way to determine “most popular” than by sales, I’d like to hear it. Also note that Microsoft (like Sony) reports “units sold” as equal to “units shipped to retailers.”
5. Cory | May 11th, 2007 at 8:29 am
Geez. Right you are Joe. My enthusiasm for Halo took over.
And I updated the post on the pre-sale numbers.
Thanks, guys. It’s Friday, right?
6. waka | May 17th, 2007 at 10:13 pm
i want my halo 3
7. Master cheif | September 8th, 2007 at 2:03 pm
i had pre ordered my halo 3 last christmas and they were almost out of pre orders i agree that it will be a big hit
8. jm | September 19th, 2007 at 5:33 pm
One thing is for sure, I know at least a guy who preordered it before even getting the 360… ME!!!
=)
alas… my console should be home this weekend, but it adds some more “realism” to this whole post.
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