Shadow1980 said:
VGC's preorder charts are widely regarded as very inaccurate, so treat those numbers with a grain of salt. Think them more as a very loose barometer of relative success, kind of like Amazon rankings, rather than a measure of actual numbers.
That being said, I still don't expect the MCC to be setting the sales charts on fire, nor do I expect it to push a ton of hardware. It is a compilation, and compilations are rarely best-sellers and are never system-sellers. On the other hand, it is probably the best compilation in many, many years when it comes to overall value for your dollar. It doesn't just have straight ports of Halo 1-4, but instead enhances them to 1080p60. Halo 2 also is being given the Anniversary treatment that was given to Halo CE three years ago. Halo CE's multiplayer will also be playable for the first time ever on Xbox Live, which is a big deal for old-school Halo fans like myself. There's also revised achievements, a unified scoring system, and a pass for the Halo 5 beta. Even if you've played all the Halo games before, the MCC is definitely a treat.
I already have a Wii U and PS4 (got the former back in August 2013 and the latter on launch day), and even though the 360 was my primary system last generation I was going to hold off on getting an XBO until Halo 5 came out. But when the MCC was announced, I decided I was going to get an XBO a lot earlier than that. Now, had it been just Halo 2 Anniversary, I would have still waited until Halo 5, but Halo 1's MP being playable on XBL for the first time ever was a huge deal for me. It's still my favorite in the series, and as someone who doesn't get to play LANs anymore except maybe once every couple of blue moons, being able to play it whenever I want was worth the $460 admission price. The only problem is coming up with the money in a reasonable amount of time.
While I'm just one person, I will say that it's a good bet that the MCC will have at least a modest audience, if only one of dedicated Halo fans. According to VGC, Halo CE Anniversary has sold 2.27M copies to date, 1.5M of which were sold in Q4 2011. Meanwhile, Halo 3 has pulled nearly 12 million copies and Reach and Halo 4 pulled over 9 million, with all three pulling around 7 million during their launch quarters. Meanwhile, ODST, a spinoff, has sold 6.25M to date, nearly 4.5 million being in Q4 2014. So, I expect the MCC to do a lot better than HCEA but nowhere nearly as well as any of the main series games. If it does well enough, it could more closely resemble ODSTs sales. The low current install base could also be a hindrance for sales this quarter. Overall, if I had to guess I think the MCC will sell maybe 2.5-3 million copies this quarter and 5-6 million lifetime. As for its effect on hardware sales, it will be likely be modest. Even with Halo 3, the 360 sold only 528k units in the U.S. in September 2007, only about 250k more than the previous month. The MCC may only add a couple hundred thousand units to November at best, probably not enough to pass the PS4.
(Note: If you want to get pedantic, Halo 3, ODST, and Reach came out like the last week or next to last week of Q3. I just use "Q4" for expedience.)
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