It’s official. Call of Duty: World at War has sold more units on the Xbox 360 than Gears of War 2. The latest worldwide charts reveal that the latest offering in the famous war shooter series has managed to sell 4.34 million units since its release (and that's not including other formats), with it just now eclipsing the 4.30 million units of Gears of War 2 sold. A figure made all the more impressive given that Gears of War 2 released a week ahead of Call of Duty: WoW.

This gap will increase too, with Call of Duty: WoW consistently selling upwards of 50,000 more units a week more than Epic Games sci-fi shooter. And that success is translating to the online space as well, with Call of Duty: WoW the week’s most played Xbox Live game, beating out Halo, with Gears of War 2 coming in third just ahead, interestingly, of Call of Duty 4.

While both games have been a rousing success critically and financially, this result indicates an interesting shift in power, or at least presumed power, between exclusives and multi-format titles. We recently discussed this in-depth, running through the sales results for both the PS3 and the Xbox 360 to determine which was more dependent upon exclusives in terms of attach-rates and consumer trends. While you should check out that article for the full scoop, this would offer further proof that exclusives while important, aren’t the key contributor to the general bottom-line of a console’s success.

On a slightly different note, it offers some insights into the Xbox 360 consumer.

It would be hard to split which of the two brand names has more power within the Xbox community. The original Gears of War was the first blockbuster exclusive of this generation, while Call of Duty cemented itself as one of gaming’s premier franchises with 2007’s brilliant Modern Warfare. (check out the Top 50 Franchises of Next-Generation for more). But for all its media attention, and Microsoft support, Call of Duty is proving to be the more alluring purchase.

Does this indicate that gamers prefer first-person (CoD) to third-person (GoW), realistic worlds (CoD) to Sci-fi (GoW), nondescript heroes (CoD) to iconic characters (GoW)? Either way, it is worth noting that in the lead up to the launch of the two games, Call of Duty: WoW was the one facing the bigger uphill battle. It needed to hurdle two huge obstacles: the first being whether returning the series to the well-worn WWII era would be happily consumed by Modern Warfare’s fans. The second being whether stand-in developer Treyarch (who struggled to deliver compelling gameplay with Call of Duty 3) could provide an experience that would interest the series’ fans. Apparently the answer to both is yes, and yes.

We’ll monitor the charts to see how things evolve over the coming months as these two heavyweights battle for Xbox 360 supremacy. In the meantime, why not check out The Top 50 Xbox Characters of All Time, or our exclusive Cliffy B Tells All interview with Gears famous developer.