Zelda has one of the most loyal and well outspoken fan bases of any series that exists int he industry. What that generally means is you can always expect a pretty good opener for any Zelda game at least a minimum for them. Nice to have something like that eh.
Now what we are looking at for Zelda Wii is a few things.
1. Easily the most hyped Wii game that will release when it does come out and probably the most hyped game that will have released on the system EVER.
2. A game that can get both the core and mainstream gamers on first day/first week along with over a time with casual/new gamers.
3. This is going to be an even more important title for the Wii because it will be the first console Zelda game built specifically for the system itself and the first one since all the way back in 2006.
What I think this means is maybe we can break the boundaries of the sales here a little bit. This game could easily do over 2 million in its first week which is definitely not the norm for most Zelda games. Considering it'll probably release in the November timeframe (whether 2010 or 2011 and yes I mean that haha), then we can probably expect a good 4-5 million in its first year.
But this is going to be still difficult to predict at such an early stage but advertising and hype is definitely strong. I mean this game is getting more hype right now than some of the games that are just about to release and that are big. I mean Zelda is just a huge franchise when it comes to the core gaming market. Personally I think this game will open to over 1 million and sell well over 7 million lifetime, depending on if it can at least do decent numbers in Japan. But I think this Zelda game has the potential to be the biggest seller in the series considering at least 80 million systems to sell on when it comes out, coming off the huge hit that wast Twilight Princess both commercially and critically, and of course that this will be the game Nintendo makes it's big title both commercially and spiritually.
Meaning, I really don't want to be that guy that first comes out and says it, but this game has everything setup to be a 10 million seller which is a big deal right now. It'll all depend on the quality of the title (for Zelda not whether if it is good but how good it is within the Zelda series), marketing and hype (which is already huge), and how Nintendo is able to sell it pass the core to the casual and new gamers (who undoubtedly picked up Twilight Princess as well during the hype of the Wii launch and beyond til of course Galaxy came out). Zelda series has never been one to be a long time seller at the rates of say the Mario or Pokemon games, but Nintendo is on a roll lately so maybe they can turn Zelda into the same thing.
I can't wait for this game to come out and can't wait to see first trailers of it this June at E3.
