Yup even beating the newly crowned leader Pokemon Black/White at 2.6 million first week, I believe Monster Hunter Freedom 3 on the PSP can be the biggest launch for a game in Japan ever.

Here's the facts:

A look at the pre-orders.

Sept5: 440K

Sept12: 560K

Sept19: 650K

Sept26: 750K

In a month it received 300K+ preorders, MHF3 is releasing in Japan December 1, 2010 (2 months away still), so let's say this pattern keeps up, that's another 600K preorders or 1.35 million pre-orders in total (I assume close to the launch the number will go up drastically, so this should be about the MINIMUM number of preorders). Pokemon Black/White had 1.65 million pre-orders when it launched.

In the daily updated charts Monster Hunter Freedom 3 is by far the highest scored game with 2299 points, second place being GT5 with 290 points.

Also just a heads up here's Japans top 10 first week games

1	Pocket Monsters Black / White (DS) ポケットモンスター ブラック・ホワイト‎ Nintendo	2010	1	2,609,129	2,609,129
2	Final Fantasy VIII (PS) ファイナルファンタジー VIII Square	1999	1	2,592,405	2,592,405
3	Dragon Quest IX: Hoshizora no Mamoribito(DS) ドラゴンクエストIX 星空の守り人 Square Enix	2009	1	2,338,221	2,338,221
4	Dragon Quest VIII: Sora to Umi to Daichi to Norowareshi Himegimi (PS2) ドラゴンクエストVIII 空と海と大地と呪われし姫君 Enix	2004	1	2,267,827	2,267,827
5	Final Fantasy IX (PS) ファイナルファンタジー IX Square	2000	1	2,031,207	2,031,207
6	Final Fantasy VII (PS) ファイナルファンタジー VII Square	1997	1	2,025,834	2,025,834
7	Final Fantasy X (PS2) ファイナルファンタジーX Square	2001	1	1,906,152	1,906,152
8	Dragon Quest VII: Eden no Senshi-tachi (PS) ドラゴンクエストVII エデンの戦士たち Enix	2000	1	1,821,450	1,821,450
9	Final Fantasy XII (PS2) ファイナルファンタジー XII Square Enix	2006	1	1,819,872	1,819,872
10	Pokémon Diamond / Pearl (DS) ポケットモンスター ダイヤモンド / パール Nintendo	2006	1	1,646,064	1,646,064

If Monster Hunter Freedom 3 doesn't make first it'll definitely be in the top 3.

I don't think the first week shipment will be high enough to break the first week sales record.

Capcom expects to ship 3.6 million by March 2011.

Yeah the shipment will be the issue here....if shipment is there can it pass Pokemon record? For sure

Hey it's back with replies! lol

On another note, Pre-orders are now 1.15 million!! daaamn still well over a month to go.

I dont think MH is bigger than pokemon....

Pkmn will stay at #1

i just don't see how it's going to beat the last psp monster hunter's total worldwide sales, in its first week in Japan, and by a pretty large amount. I say it won't though those preorders are indeed crazy.

Going by history, some people on the COMGnet thread pointed out that preorders for the MH series are a larger percentage of sales than the preorder numbers for pokemon games.  So basically, historically at least, if a pokemon game and a MH game both had the same preorder numbers at launch, pokemon would open higher, because it's overall numbers are less represented in preorders.  More people go in and buy without preorders.

Of course, MH appears to be growing in popualrity, so maybe things will change.