Rainbird on 12 November 2011
First, even if 5 mio. is the wrong number, chances are they came up with most accurate estimate they could get at the time and used that.
Secondly, NPD is US-only, so its numbers are a bit limited. VGC has the first week sales for BF3 at around 4 mio. (not counting Japan where it wasn't released when EA said 5 mio.), and if you include digital sales and account for PR-talk, 5 mio. probably isn't a terrible guess.
