In answer to some relevant questions.

The prediction is for the North American market. I am sorry I was not more specific I will correct that in the original post. The first reason is that the game launches three days later in Europe on a Friday as opposed to a Tuesday. The second reason is a release date for Japan has not been announced, but granted no discussion it might not actually arrive this year. So obviously a world wide prediction would be a flawed prediction, and a impossible one as well.

Why hardware and software. There are many reasons to do this. One reason is to make the predictions challenging. There are more combinations, and more thought is required. That brings about greater discussion which is the real point behind a thread. This also is relevant to other questions about holiday hardware performance, and software performance. Which we should be getting in the mindset to discuss. This should make the thread more entertaining then a simple one number prediction thread.

G 500000 H 250000

I'll go high on the hardware due to Halo 3 and probably some nice 360 bundles this Christmas season.

i think it will sell around 2 million lifetime.
G 500 000 H 200 000

Game-600K (I think alot of FPS fans and RPG will pick it up)
Hardware- 300 K (Halo 3 will still be growing by then, lots of parents buying christmas gifts for their little Halo fans.)

It is November so I expect both HW and SW will be quite high.

360s 300k
Mass Effect 650k

Current spread for total sales

950,000
900,000
850,000
800,000
785,000
750,000 x2
715,000
700,000 x2
650,000
600,000
570,000
550,000 x2
525,000

Average total= 710,000
Average software=498,000
Average hardware=211,000

Average sale of game to console 2.4 to 1.
Highest sale of game to console by poster was 1.25 to 1.
Lowest sale of game to console by poster was 4 to 1.

Most common software prediction 600,000
Most common hardware prediction 200,000/300,000
Common margin of sell through of game to console 2.4 to 1.

Should be interesting to see how these numbers evolve over time. These were current as of time of posting, and will not be edited. I apologize fully for any mathematical errors. This will serve as a good measure as to whether current opinion changes over the next month.

ONE WEEK WARNING.

Game: 750k
360: 300k

Game: 735,000
Hardware: 265,000

G: 585,000
H: 365,000