I think metroid is a good game for what it is. And is pretty much assured 1m sales worldwide just on name and Wii popularity alone. But I really think all of this comparison to Halo in any fashion is just so ridiculous.

The day Nintendo decides to try and make Metroid the Halo killer is the day Ill likely stop playing Metroid. They are two different games. I boot up Halo when I want some killer multiplayer, I boot up Metroid when I want an engrossing 1 player adventure. Metroid will not close a gap or sell near Halo3. Please stop the madness, this is not Sparta. Let it go.

Good subject. We're talking about two anticipated games, one was supposed to be a launch title and the other have a release date closer than what we were hoping. As of now we can compare these two games. I don't read anyone saying that Microsoft make games generally for the same kind of gamers, we can already say that Halo 3 is for the same kind of people who bought Gears of War. Halo 3 will surely 5 million copies in the first months, but the sale will slowdown really fast two just like Halo 2 and Gears of War. Huge Sales in the first months of many millions copies and a rapid drop in sales not to long after. We also have to take in comparison that Halo 2 was the sequel to a great game so people were aniticipated it, but many were deceived : great multiplayer, poor single player. Also many people are deceive by the Beta right now, so I don't think the sales if Halo 3 will reaches those of Halo 2. For Metroid it's an other story, the first one was surely one of the best games ever. The advantage of Metroid is the fact that he is one of the few Nintendo games on the Wii, and see the crap third party's are porting on the Wii right now Wii owner will jump on it, so expect Corruption to sell the same amount of copies of Zelda on Wii, he will easly sell more than the first two games. Add on that that fan of the series will buy it, but if Nintendo's marketing don't change and that the game is the exemple of how FPS play on Wii, he can attract some PC gamers to. I'm not sure Metroid will reach the sales of Halo 3, but he as the potential to and he can also have higher sales, but again we can't make any prediciton with any Wii games. One year ago, many people were saying that Nintendo was doomed, and what happened now, the Wii is the fastest selling console, any game from Nintendo can reproduce these kind of situation.

Even if Metroid turns out to be 10 times better than Halo 3, Halo 3 will outsell it by multiple times. Halo 3 will break the records of Halo 2, Metroid will sell well but not more than 2 million ish...

metroid will not sell as much as halo no matter what. Halo is microsoft's biggest title on the system, while Metroid is like Nintendo's 5th biggest. Metroid is competing with games like Mario Galaxy and SSBB coming out in a similar timeframe. Metroid doesn't need to match Halo at all, I mean, does xbox have a game like SSBB or Mario Galaxy?

i guess the importance of Metroid is that it is going to set the bar for FPS games with the wiimote

Great post. You're right on the money that MP3 will be heavily under the microscope for its controls. So far, all other Wii FPS games have had issues in this department. Being a 2nd party title, if Nintendo/Retro can't get it right then who else will? And since the Wii can't produce a game as pretty as Halo 3 or R: FoM, Nintendo needs to prove to these 'hardcore' gamers that motion controls are a better choice than graphics and that the Wii is a system worth getting. On the other hand, I don't think Metroid will be the saving grace for Nintendo when it comes to FPS gamers. Assuming the controls work, a stronger third party developer will be able to build upon them and deliver a game that has all the features the 'hardcore' players are looking for (i.e. blood, on-line multi-player, realistic settings, etc.). As for sales, I've often wondered if Nintendo has shot itself in the foot when it comes to 'traditional' games. My grandmother isn't going to be picking up MP3 (or Halo 3 for that matter). And if the demographics for the Wii remain strongest in the casual gamer crowd, no one may be able to sell these types of games. In the end, I think that MP3 will have solid sales closer to the original than it's sequel. But I don't think it will have Halo 1/2/3 like numbers.

Nintendo top current franchises: 8 million WW sales potential or higher (Halo level): Mario Pokemon Nintendogs Animal Crossing Brain Age Wii-brand 4-8 million WW sales potential (Gears of War is in this range...) Zelda Mario Kart (could be on the high end of this range...) Smash Bros. 2-4 million WW sales potential (anything of this level is still a highly important release... Like say Fable, and maybe Forza or PGR...) Metroid WarioWare Mario Party Paper Mario Yoshi Other Mario spin-offs (Luigi?, Some sports titles) Big Brain Academy Various Pokemon spin-offs Star Fox, Pikmin and Donkey Kong (Big "maybes" similar to Forza and PGR) Long and short of it is... I don't think Nintendo is worried about having a "Halo killer." I think they have been unfortunate to have all three Metroid Prime games debut opposite Halo games, making comparisons unavoidable. But they've got Halo-sized franchises out the wazoo. Nintendo talks constantly about Nintendo being the disrupter, and Metroid is exactly that, it's there to disrupt and 'steal' sales from Halo, not go head to head, but to cut a chunk out of it. Uh... That's not really what disruption means. Yes, they don't go head-to-head, but no, they don't care about "stealing" or "taking a chunk" of existing MS customers. That sounds like fighting MS in the "red ocean."

That's not what I meant by that... I mean more that they disrupt with something that can't be done on any other platform so those people that are stuck in the other way might just come across and 'have a look'. And like it or not Metroid Prime is a torpedo being fired into the Red Ocean because the people who play those games are over there sitting in life boats waiting to be picked up by one of the big ships, but maybe they might choose to jump in the safer and sneakier Submarine.

The only way MP3 can outsell Halo3 is if the Wii wins the console war by a big extent, say 5-1. Otherwise Halo is just such a killer ap that I cant see MP3 which isnt one of Nintendo's top grade franchises taking its crown.

 Zelda:TP Has done 4m worldwide to date. 3.2m on the Wii version alone. Red steel, as bad as people say it is, has done over a million worldwide, and its a new IP. There is already proof that traditional games can/will sell.