If anyone looks at the sales history of all the Metroid games, they'll see that the first Metroid game and Metroid Prime are the best selling games in the series. Also, compared to most franchises, even in it's glory days, Metroid was never that popular. While I agree that Nintendo's marketing efforts for Metroid Prime 3 were not as great as Metroid Prime 1 or 2, I don't think the Metroid series has a marketing issue. I think when compared to Halo, it's not as accessible to gamers as Halo. Halo and other FPS's are easier for gamers to get into. Metroid requires patience and a certain kind of discipline that many gamers simply do not possess. It's the reason why back in the day, Mario was the big seller while Metroid was not, just like nowadays how Halo is the big selling game while Metroid is not.
To make it sound simpler, Halo has more market potential than Metroid. The same goes for Nintendo other games that appeal to older gamers, maybe with the exception of Zelda. Although, then again, Zelda can't pull in the kind of numbers that Call of Duty can. Of course, if Nintendo was like certain other developers (cough, Capcom, cough), they would cheapen some of their franchises in order make them more like some popular franchises in the West.
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