Pemalite said:
It does matter. - Bungie made two Spin-offs, ODST and Reach as they were 'done' with the original trilogy. - Microsoft then set 343i to make the next trilogy. - Any games outside of those trilogies are "spin-offs".
Halo Wars is marketed towards the Halo audience. - It even has Halo in it's name... Can't make this stuff up. Adding ODST doesn't really favour you at all... It only just further reinforces the shifting of the goal post. |
I still don't understand why you wouldn't include Halo Reach into the debate. Just because the story is a spin off doesn't mean its not a mainline Halo game. Reach is still a Halo game regardless what the story is about. ODST is an expansion to Halo 3 but again I have no issue brining it up. Reach capitalised on sales the same 4 did and both went on to sell 10m each one after the other. Remasters and RTS games are not meant to outsell the core games, that's a given in most series.
The point is Halo is a huge juggernaut of an IP worth billions and is up there with some of the biggest games in the industry. Reach is included into this debate because its a serious Halo game that was built from the ground up with its own identity which offered a traditional Halo campaign and Multiplayer mode. Not a RTS or Mobile Halo game.. its meant to be a traditional Halo game and that's what sells the franchise.
The graph you linked shows the typical up and down pattern which majority of franchises have. I don't see a decline in the sense you are seeing. I see that Halo 5 is its downer this gen and based off the record the next big Halo game is set to raise the needle. Same way ODST was the downer and Reach was the Upper etc. Reach and 4 outsold Halo 1 and 2. That's not bad at all considering those games came out after Halo 3.
In all fairness too, as the graph grows, so does Digital sales which I wouldn't think have included Digital sales. Halo 5 could be sitting on around 6m to 7m which is similar to Halo 1 and close to Halo 2.