Huge Halo: Of course, "Halo 3" had the biggest first-day sales of any video game in history. The thing was practically unavoidable; you could even buy it at 7-Eleven.
If "Halo 3" hadn't done boffo numbers Microsoft executives would have been hung by their joystick thumbs and the Xbox 360 would be pretty much dead.
Instead, Bill Gates' minions were crowing over $170 million in sales on day one and calling it "the biggest entertainment launch in history."
That figure easily surpasses the first-day box office record set by "Spider-Man 3" and is probably pretty close to the amount that "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" pulled in during its first 24 hours on sale.
But $170 million works out to, at most, 2.83 million copies of "Halo 3" -- a fraction of the estimated 6 million "Spidey" tickets or 8.3 million "Harry Potter" books that sold in the United States on their respective premiere days.
With nearly three million "Halo 3" discs floating around, there were bound to be some problems. Some gamers who bought the $70 limited-edition package, which comes in a metal case, found that their discs were scratched; Microsoft has offered to replace them. Xbox Live also suffered a few hiccups early, as 1 million people flooded online to play the new game against each other.
As for the game itself: The single-player campaign is merely average, but the multiplayer options are phenomenal. Fans of online shoot-'em-ups will be playing "Halo 3" for years to come.
