Halo 2 beats box office records

2000AD · Post by **2000AD** » 2004-11-12 04:23am

Now there are piles of money and there are piles of money, but the whopping sacks of cash that the creators of Halo 2 are currently carting around could probably sink the Titanic. Which is ironic really, given that, at $125 million, the game's first day sales have outperformed any Hollywood blockbuster's opening weekend. Ever.

According to Microsoft, the sequel to the immensely popular Xbox game sold more than 2.38 million copies on its release, which, if you hadn't guessed, is one hell of a lot of games. Not even Spider-Man with its record-breaking $114 million opening weekend can hold a candle to Halo's launch, making this a very good day for the folks at Bungie software, who made it all possible.

Any guesses on how much Half-Life 2 will take?

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-11-12 04:27am

Video games don't have box offices.

More correct would be "sales" records.

EDIT: Nevermind, they're making a comparison, but it still sounds silly to me.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2004-11-12 04:31am

Yeah, two years of 'I can't wait for Halo2; good games are hard to find' will do that. EB dudes claimed 45,000 preorders in AU alone; thats ridiculous. Specially since on PC it'd be a weapons mod, released weeks after Halo

Chris OFarrell · Post by **Chris OFarrell** » 2004-11-12 04:43am

45,000 Preorders is just about right for AU actualy.

2000AD · Post by **2000AD** » 2004-11-12 04:47am

I wonder what it would look like if someone factored in that a movie ticket costs about £5, but Halo 2 costs about £39.99.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-11-12 05:23am

It's roughly a factor of six.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2004-11-12 08:24am

Posted it in the Halo 2 thread first

125$, most movies don't see that much in their first week, let alone the first day!

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-11-12 10:35am

Half-Life 2 will not go as high as Halo 2 on first day sales. PC games never get that sort of attention. However total Half-Life 2 sales will probably over shadow total Halo 2 sales. Half-Life sold something like 10 million copies. Halo never got that many.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-11-12 10:47am

Alyeska wrote:Half-Life 2 will not go as high as Halo 2 on first day sales. PC games never get that sort of attention. However total Half-Life 2 sales will probably over shadow total Halo 2 sales. Half-Life sold something like 10 million copies. Halo never got that many.

I see HL2 trouncing this "Halo 2" quite easily soon enough.

Hollywood is said to be saluting the games industry now for pulling this off. Expect a Halo movie anytime soon (hell, there's a Far Cry one anyway).

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-11-12 10:49am

Ace Pace wrote:Posted it in the Halo 2 thread first

125$, most movies don't see that much in their first week, let alone the first day!

For a comparison, M:I-2, a former record breaker, got some $57M for the opening weekend.

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2004-11-12 11:09am

Admiral Valdemar wrote:I see HL2 trouncing this "Halo 2" quite easily soon enough.

Hollywood is said to be saluting the games industry now for pulling this off. Expect a Halo movie anytime soon (hell, there's a Far Cry one anyway).

A Halo movie funded by Microsoft, under Bungie's control would rock.

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2004-11-12 11:17am

Admiral Valdemar wrote: I see HL2 trouncing this "Halo 2" quite easily soon enough.

Don't be so sure.

Remember that the installed base of people with a PC capable of playing Half Life 2 is lower, and that PC games traditionally don't sell as well as console ones.

To beat Halo 2's launch performance, Half Life 2 will have to outdo the biggest PC game launch in history thirty times over (Sims 2, the biggest PC launch seller yet, racked one million copies in ten days, and remember that The Sims has far wider appeal than any FPS can aspire to, the whole other 50% of the world).

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-11-12 11:19am

Yeah, but based on the total sales figures of Half-Life and Halo, Half-Life 2's total sales will more than likely be much more than Halo 2's total sales.

FireNexus · Post by **FireNexus** » 2004-11-12 11:20am

i think that whole "fully computer animated movie" concept could even work. The only reason final fantasy sucked is beause they had inept script writers. With Bungie making sure it doesn't get fucked up, it could rock hard.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-11-12 11:20am

Besides, who's willing to say there aren't more PCs than Xboxes?

FireNexus wrote:i think that whole "fully computer animated movie" concept could even work. The only reason final fantasy sucked is beause they had inept script writers. With Bungie making sure it doesn't get fucked up, it could rock hard.

Check out The Polar Express if you think realistic CGI animated films died after FF: TSW.

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2004-11-12 11:22am

Alyeska wrote:Half-Life 2 will not go as high as Halo 2 on first day sales. PC games never get that sort of attention. However total Half-Life 2 sales will probably over shadow total Halo 2 sales. Half-Life sold something like 10 million copies. Halo never got that many.

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=19575

Analysts expect Microsoft to flog more than 10 million units of Halo 2 mostly around November. The original Halo sold five million units and remains the best seller on the Xbox

Projected to sell more copies in a month than Half-life has sold over its lifetime is damn impressive.

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2004-11-12 11:23am

How many of those PCs have a decent DirectX9 VGA card though. There are many more PCs in the world than Xboxes, but 95% of them simply won't run high end games, so their owners don't buy them.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-11-12 11:27am

Well then we'll just have to wait and see, won't we?

But I predict that HL2 will outsell H2, and I mean total sales, not launch sales.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-11-12 11:39am

Vendetta wrote:How many of those PCs have a decent DirectX9 VGA card though. There are many more PCs in the world than Xboxes, but 95% of them simply won't run high end games, so their owners don't buy them.

Just as well HL2 isn't an insanely high resource demanding game then, unlike some I can name.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-11-12 11:42am

I would actually prefer a TV series based on the Halo universe - perhaps an animated series - but that won't happen.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-11-12 11:46am

Joe wrote:I would actually prefer a TV series based on the Halo universe - perhaps an animated series - but that won't happen.

Yeah, the guys who did Starship Troopers: Roughnecks would be brilliant.

Hotfoot · Post by **Hotfoot** » 2004-11-12 12:13pm

Joe wrote:I would actually prefer a TV series based on the Halo universe - perhaps an animated series - but that won't happen.

Well, it's not what you're looking for, but at least we'll always have Red vs Blue

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-11-12 12:19pm

Vendetta wrote:
Don't be so sure.

Remember that the installed base of people with a PC capable of playing Half Life 2 is lower, and that PC games traditionally don't sell as well as console ones.

To beat Halo 2's launch performance, Half Life 2 will have to outdo the biggest PC game launch in history thirty times over (Sims 2, the biggest PC launch seller yet, racked one million copies in ten days, and remember that The Sims has far wider appeal than any FPS can aspire to, the whole other 50% of the world).

Doesn't matter. The original HL was still selling high long after the launch. A single big sell can still be overshadowed easily by continual sales when people find out how good it is and get the hardware if they lack it. Additionally, the likes of Counterstrike 2 and the numerous additions to the game mean HL2 will have a wider base and longer life than Halo 2.

Look at how well GTA: SA sold and then imagine that for a game that has been anticipated since 1998.

The Kernel · Post by **The Kernel** » 2004-11-12 05:12pm

Admiral Valdemar wrote: Doesn't matter. The original HL was still selling high long after the launch. A single big sell can still be overshadowed easily by continual sales when people find out how good it is and get the hardware if they lack it. Additionally, the likes of Counterstrike 2 and the numerous additions to the game mean HL2 will have a wider base and longer life than Halo 2.

Look at how well GTA: SA sold and then imagine that for a game that has been anticipated since 1998.

You really don't know very much about this do you? Maybe you should look at the Halo sales numbers over the last three years since its launch before claiming that Halo didn't have any staying power in retail. There's a reason they left it at $50 for two years.

Alan Bolte · Post by **Alan Bolte** » 2004-11-12 05:22pm

Outperforming box office sales is sort of put into perspective when you consider that games sell for as much as ten times as much as movie tickets.