All i expected from sales were flat results in the West (sales level with that of Metroid Prime 3), with maybe a small boost in the Americas, and then significant gains in Japan. I suppose my own prediction of 2.5 million was a little high even for that, but 2 million would have been a safe bet.

Now it'll be hard-pressed to beat Corruption, which is quite odd given that i had branded Corruption as an under-performer overall.

1. Corruption was much more cinematic than the first Prim. So was Echoes.

2. You have nothing on which to base this statement.

3. No it doesn't, you are wrong and apparently cannot appreciate characterization in silence. That's fine. You not appreciating it doesn't make it a valid criticism.

4. No, you don't know storytelling. Metroid Other M said a lot more new about Samus because it changed her character so significantly, but the Prime games fleshed out Samus significantly all without her ever talking. We knew all we needed to know.

1.Cinematic? We're talking a lack of consumer enthousiam for the game. The fact that it became more cinematic and still sold less, speaks for that.  

2. Then give me an explantion why salesnumbers halved. Could it be, they didn't make a game the previous Metroid-buyers wanted? Remember, you can't blame the consumer.

3. I can appreciate silence, and pan-scenes very well. But there needs to be a contrast for it to work properly. And even then its interaction of scenes and silence has to tell something. Something relevant to a person or a character. And most silent scenes are between characters, which means you still need some interaction. After all any movie or story is about interaction, how silent it is.

Have you seen L'ours. It's about non-talking bears. The idea about a big male bear caring for a small orphan bear, is more characterization then the whole Prime series combined. It has silence, but also a real story about interaction between characters, even if they're bears.

4. Prime (series) didn't flesh out anything. What you knew, you made up by yourself. The Prime games didn't tell you. That's why other m was never going to work in your mind. It could never fitt with your preconcieved idea. 

While Nintendo's very vigorously fighting piracy (just got another junk firmware update yesterday entirely to that cause), i'm not certain they've ever blamed piracy for their own software's failings.

BTW, accepting that what's in the game is consistent with the manga, I'll paraphrase "Sci Fi Debris" (specifically starting at 7:42 in this video): you don't get credit for what you didn't put in the game, because you didn't put it in the game.

If the manga makes it clear that she had this characterization the whole time, you also need to make it clear in the game that she had this the whole time. If this game had shown flashbacks to previous games, showing that she still wasn't over it, and it was only really strong will that got her past this, and maybe it finally gave out when she met Ridley once again but she then found her strength afterwards, then it wouldn't have been so bad. You don't just leave stuff like that out and expect us to buy that it all makes sense if we look at the extra material.

And that's not even taking into account whether it's a good idea for someone with PSTD to go by herself on what are basically extended commando missions deep behind enemy lines.

I thought the advertising campaign was awful over here in the UK. The adverts did those stupid shots of people playing it - exactly the wrong image for the market that will buy this game. They should have pummeled the public with FMV shots (and some perhaps gameplay) as they look incredible.

Well when it comes to games, the simple solution is a game that doesn't appeal mainly to those likely to pirate it (not that there won't be a lot of pirating, just plenty of actual sales as well).

The problem with a lot of EU piracy is the fact that Nintendo themselves aren't supporting every country like they should so its either import the game from other countries at higher prices than HD titles or fire up some flash cards and homebrew and be done with it, currently sad to say in some regions its more convient to pirate, while having ample supply at a retail store could be so much easier.  This is a big reason Sony has such a good standing in the region, SNES days some countries had to get their games at awfully high prices and then the PS1 came along and supplied them with games.

Well there is the matter of Sony having support in general in those contries even before the Playstation brand started. But it is best for Nintendo to continue to expand.

There is no way to deny that, Sony already had relations with retailers there and used it, but if Nintendo is to compete especially with their newfound leadership in the market, they should use it to expand to those areas, create those relations, which this doesn't effect me in anyway so I'm a happy camper but you know people would like to be able to walk to the store and buy some Wii Fit lol