Understanding Halo

[Michael-5]

Well Halo: Reach is around the corner, and there is a lot of speculation to how well the game will sell. The game currently has just a little more Pre-orders the Modern Warfare 2, and about 1.5 times the Pre-orders of Halo 3, which to my knowledge had 1.1 million Pre-orders (Please correct me if I'm wrong). So if Reach sells in a similar fashion to Halo 3, it could potentially outsell Halo 3 by 73%. I doubt the game will sell 19 million copies (I'm guessing 14.5 million personally), but to be fair I thought it would be smart to compare pre-orders and weekly sales to past core games in the franchise. This way, once week one, two, three, etc figures come in, we can compare it's sales and make more accurate estimates on total game sales. So here we go.

Note -  Halo: Combat Evolved is excluded from the comparison because VGChartz does not have weekly sales data for the game. The game did go on and sell 6.43 million as a Launch title for the X-Box. This gives it a Software-Hardware ratio of 0.261, meaning that 26.1% of X-Box owners own a copy of Halo: Combat Evolved, which was a launch title for the 360.

Note - Halo 3, and ODST were released in September, so the 10 week data does not include December sales, where sales were very strong. So those games sold about a million more copies in December.

Halo 2 (Released November 9th 2004 in Americas, November 11th 2004 in EMEAA/Japan).

	Game Sales	Console Sales	Software-Hardware Ratio	Halo 2. vs Halo Reach
Pre-Orders	N/A	163k / 16,986k	N/A	N/A
Week 1	3,302k	238k / 17,224k	0.194	1 : 1.227
Week 2	690k / 3,992k	307k / 17,530k	0.229	1 : 1.219
Week 3	409k / 4,400k	461k / 17,991k	0.246	1 : 1.202
Week 4 (Dec 4th)	313k / 4,713k	309k / 18,300k	0.257	1 : 1.176
Week 5	307k / 5,020k	404k / 18,703k	0.267	1 : 1.134
Week 6	382k / 5,403k	502k / 19,205k	0.281	1 : 1.074
Week 7 (Dec 25th)	432k / 5,835k	481k / 19,686k	0.294	1 : 1.013
Week 8 (Jan 1st)	114k / 5,949k	167k / 19,853k	0.300	1 : 1.015
Week 9	59k / 6,009k	103k / 19,956k	0.301	1 : 1.024
Week 10	55k / 6,064k	100k / 20,055k	0.302	1 : 1.034
Week 11	55k / 6,119k	94k / 20,150k	0.304	1 : 1.054
Week 12	54k / 6,173k	90k / 20,240k	0.305	1 : 1.080
Week 13 (Feb 5th)	45k / 6,218k	83k / 20,323k	0.306	1 : 1.098
Week 14	39k / 6,257k	77k / 20,400k	0.307	1 : 1.133
Week 15	35k / 6,292k	76k / 20,476k	0.307

The game went on to sell 8.38 million units, on a console which only sold 24.65 million units. This gives the final Software-Hardware ratio of 0.340. This means that 34% of X-Box owners have a copy of Halo 2, a game that came out 3 years after the launch of the console.

Halo 3 (Released on September 25th 2007 in Americas, September 26th 2007 in EMEAA, and September 27th 2007 in Japan)

	Game Sales	Console Sales	Software-Hardware Ratio	Halo 3 vs. Halo Reach
Pre-Orders	1,100k	165k / 11,599k	0.095	1 : 1.811
Week 1	3,815k	230k / 11,829k	0.323	1 : 1.062
Week 2 (Oct 6th)	782k / 4,598k	213k / 12,042k	0.382	1 : 1.059
Week 3	328k / 4,926k	200k / 12,242k	0.402	1 : 1.073
Week 4	183k / 5,109k	179k / 12,421k	0.411	1 : 1.085
Week 5	124k / 5,232k	173k / 12,594k	0.415	1 : 1.088
Week 6 (Nov 3rd)	114k / 5,346k	195k / 12,789k	0.418	1: 1.086
Week 7	108k / 5,454k	195k / 12,984k	0.420	1 : 1.084
Week 8	116k / 5,571k	229k / 13,213k	0.422	1 : 1.084
Week 9	173k / 5,743k	418k / 13,631k	0.422	1 : 1.071
Week 10 (Dec 1st)	163k / 5,907k	324k / 13,955k	0.423	1 : 1.062
Week 11	208k / 6,115k	423k / 14,325k	0.427	1 : 1.055
Week 12	260k / 6,375k	507k / 14,832k	0.430	1 : 1.046
Week 13	298k / 6,672k	587k / 15,419k	0.433	1 : 1.023
Week 14 (Dec 29th)	178k / 6,850k	329k / 15,748k	0.435	1 : 1.035
Week 15	109k / 6,959k	204k / 15,952k	0.436

Currently Halo 3 has sold 11.14 million units, on a console with 42.71 million owners. So the Software-Hardware ratio is 0.261, meaning that 26.1% of 360 owners own a copy of Halo 3, a game that came out two years after the launch of the console.

Halo 3: ODST (Released on September 22nd 2009 in Americas and EMEAA, and September 24th, 2009 in Japan)

	Game Sales	Console Sales	Software-Hardware Ratio	Halo 3: ODST vs. Halo: Reach
Pre-Orders	754k	129k / 31,736k	0.024	1 : 2.642
Week 1	2,216k	147k / 31,882k	0.069	1 : 1.828
Week 2 (Oct 3rd)	467k / 2,683k	150k / 32,033k	0.084	1 : 1.814
Week 3	217k / 2,900k	151k / 32,183k	0.090	1 : 1.823
Week 4	137k / 3,036k	146k / 32,330k	0.094	1 : 1.826
Week 5	98k / 3,135k	152k / 32,482k	0.097	1 : 1.816
Week 6	79k / 3,214k	193k / 32,675k	0.098	1 : 1.806
Week 7 (Nov 7th)	78k / 3,291k	311k / 32,987k	0.100	1 : 1.797
Week 8	84k / 3,375k	438k / 33,424k	0.101	1 : 1.789
Week 9	116k / 3,491k	358k / 33,782k	0.103	1 : 1.762
Week 10	183k / 3,673k	540k / 34,322k	0.107	1 : 1.708
Week 11	113k / 3,787k	452k / 34,683k-a	0.109	1 : 1.703
Week 12	167k / 3,954k	538k / 35,221k	0.112	1 : 1.686
Week 13	200k / 4,153k	679k / 35,900k	0.116	1 : 1.644
Week 14	241k / 4,395k	746k / 36,647k	0.120	1 : 1.613
Week 15	94k / 4,489k	311k / 36,958k	0.121

Currently Halo 3: ODST has sold 5.58 million copies, on a console with 42.71 million units. So the software-hardware ratio is 0.131, meaning that 13.1% of all 360 owners have a copy of Halo 3: ODST, a game that released 4 years after the launch of the console. Currently the game still sells in the range of 20-40k weekly, on a console which sells 180-200k weekly, a ratio of approximately 0.12-0.20 games sold for each new 360 owners.

Note: The Jump in sales during week 8, to above PS3 levels, was due to the release of Modern Warfare 2 with a limited edition Modern Warfare 2 X-box 360, 250 gig.

Halo: Reach

	Game Sales	Console Sales	Software-Hardware Ratio	vs. Halo 2	vs. Halo 3	vs. Halo 3: ODST
Pre-Orders	1,992k	42,890k	0.046	N/A	x 1.811	x 2.642
Week 1	4,050k	43,334k	0.093	x 1.227	x 1.062	x 1.828
Week 2	818k / 4,868k	43,532k	0.112	x 1.219	x 1.059	x 1.814
Week 3	419k / 5,287k	43,711k	0.121	x 1.202	x 1.073	x 1.823
Week 4	258k / 5,544k	43,753k-a	0.127	x 1.176	x 1.085	x 1.826
Week 5	150k / 5,694k	43,915k	0.130	x 1.134	x 1.088	x 1.816
Week 6	111k / 5,805k	44,159k	0.131	x 1.074	x 1.086	x 1.806
Week 7	108k / 5,913k	44,384k	0.133	x 1.013	x 1.084	x 1.797
Week 8	126k / 6,039k	44,718k	0.135	x 1.015	x 1.084	x 1.789
Week 9	123k / 6,152k	45,157k	0.136	x 1.024	x 1.071	x 1.762
Week 10	120k / 6,272k	45,576k	0.138	x 1.034	x 1.062	x 1.708
Week 11	179k / 6,451k	46,421k	0.139	x 1.054	x 1.055	x 1.703
Week 12	156k / 6,667k	47,323k	0.141	x 1.080	x 1.046	x 1.686
Week 13	218k / 6,825k	48,007k	0.142	x 1.098	x 1.023	x 1.644
Week 14	263k / 7,088k	49,009k	0.145	x 1.133	x 1.035	x 1.613
Week 15		It's over 50 million!!!

I will update this thread as weekly data comes in, -a in console sales means an adjustment was made this week, altering total console sales.

One important thing to notice is that Halo, Halo 2, and Halo 3 have attach rates of 26.1%, 34%, 26.1% respectively. If Halo Reach can achieve an attach at of say 20% by the end of 2011, that's 12 million units sold, and thats a conservative low estimate. If it achieves a 25% attach rate, that's 15 million units sold!

Also if Halo: Reach sells in a similar pattern to Halo 3, judging from Pre-orders it can do 19 million! That's a bit high for me, but all signs point to strong sales.

Halo: Reach will be released onto the X-box 360 when all previous Halo games sold on a smaller install base. This game will most likely be the best selling HD exclusive title this generation. Just to be sure, lets compare with Modern Warfare 2.

Note that Modern Warfare 2 came out in Novemeber, Holiday sales season. So it's sales may be a bit more front heavy then Halo's. A proper comparision would be to compare the number of games sold 20 weeks in as both consoles have the advantage of Holiday sales. I will be comparing Halo: Reach to both Modern Warfare titles, and Black Ops, on the 360.

	Reach Sales	MW1 Sales	vs. MW1	MW2 Sales	vs. MW2	Black Ops Sales	vs. Black Ops
Pre-Orders	1,992k	N/A	N/A	1,857k	x1.073	1,825k	x 1.092
Week 1	4,050k	1,041k	x 3.890	4,942k	x 0.820	5,669k	x 0.714
Week 2	818k / 4,868k	485k / 1,526k	x 3.190	837k / 5,779k	x 0.842	1,012k / 6,681k	x 0.728
Week 3	419k / 5,287k	358k / 1,884k	x 2.806	630k / 6,409k	x 0.825	742k / 7,423k	x 0.712
Week 4	258k / 5,544k	261k / 2,145k	x 2.585	415k / 6,824k	x 0.812	509k / 7,932k	x 0.699
Week 5	150k / 5,694k	372k / 2,517k	x 2.262	499k / 7,322k	x 0.778	527k / 8,458k	x 0.673
Week 6	111k / 5,805k	528k / 3,045k	x 1.906	591k / 7,914k	x 0.734	621k / 9,079k	x 0.639
Week 7	108k / 5,913k	637k / 3,682k	x 1.606	680k / 8,594k	x 0.688
Week 8	126k / 6,039k	303k / 3,985k	x 1.515	296k / 8,990k	x 0.672
Week 9	123k / 6,152k	181k / 4,166k	x 1.477	166k / 9,056k	x 0.679
Week 10	120k / 6,272k	140k / 4,305k	x 1.460	125k / 9,181k	x 0.683
Week 11	179k / 6,451k	116k / 4,397k	x 1.467	114k / 9,292k	x 0.694
Week 12	156k / 6,667k	122k / 4,519k	x 1.475	119k / 9,411k	x 0.708
Week 13	218k / 6,825k	102k / 4,621k	x 1.477	117k / 9,528k	x 0.716
Week 14	263k / 7,088k	103k / 4,734k	x 1.497	115k / 9,643k	x 0.735
Week 15		104k / 4,828k		110k / 9,753k

Also after 10 weeks of Reach sales, I will likely expand all the tables, so Reach can take advantage of Holiday sales and get an accurate representation of sales to compare with other titles.